#i haven’t been able to stop thinking about this series since i saw the promo weeks ago

[hestiashand]

i want these guys so bad it’s not even funny i’m in love with this figurine series

[ ID: six images of naruto, gaara, shikamaru, aki, denji and power from the look up series. they are all very cute chibi figurines that are sitting and looking up at the viewer. END ID. ]

[pennylogue]

Steven is a Diamond, and that’s okay.

So, Steven’s way too caught up in the fact that he’s a Diamond right now, and therefore a hideous and overpowered monster who can’t hope to be understood by normal humans or normal gems. Let’s talk about that.

For all Steven’s enthusiasm to be a Crystal Gem and to demonstrate his powers, he’s always been weirdly ashamed of how being half-Gem affects his ability to live alongside humans. I don’t think he’s ever really decided how to feel about it. It’s only after seeing Steven growing substantially and changing his hair and getting diamond eyes, now that it’s clear that his physical form is so malleable to how he thinks of himself and what he wants to be, that it really hits me how growing up with Greg and around so many humans has affected his identity. How sort of…quietly unhealthy it was, to go around with his gem covered up all of the time, and his appearance so determinedly human. I mean, think of how upset and ashamed he was when he decided his inhuman aging would screw up his friendship with Connie.

Right now, Steven is a whirlpool of self-loathing mixed into repressed issues and trauma with the Diamonds and hatred for his mother, and because he’s feeling so disconnected from and alienated and misunderstood by both other humans and other gems, because his gem powers are being triggered by his trauma, he’s connected some dots and blamed it all on being a Diamond. 

Looking back at that quiet “No,” at the end of “Fragments”, it’s easy to identify it as one of horrified realization. And you know, this is the logical conclusion of Steven’s feelings about his mother in “Mindful Education”, of “Storm in the Room”, of “Volleyball”—but it’s also the sum of a lot of other things:

Peridot: The Diamonds are the Gem matriarchs! …We live to serve them.

The culmination of Peridot flipping to the Crystal Gems is tied directly into her rejecting the Diamonds. Diamonds are introduced as the symbol of everything wrong with Homeworld.

Garnet: “How dare you fuse with a member of my court? You will be broken for this!”

…

Garnet: Pink Diamond thought for a moment, and then laughed; a wicked, empty sound. “You wish to save these life-forms at the expense of our own? Ha! Don’t be absurd. Return to your post, and I will forget your insolence.”

Diamonds are shatterers. They hate fusion. They hate Earth and organic life. They hate Garnet. They’re the evil queens in Garnet’s fairy tale. 

Garnet: The Earth belonged to Pink Diamond. Destroying her was the only way to save the planet. For Amethyst to be herself, for Pearl to be free, for me to be together. For you to exist.

Free will and the Diamonds are utterly opposed. It might be a tragedy that Pink Diamond was killed, but she was a monster, like the other Diamonds. The  ultimate enemies of the Crystal Gems.

We got almost five seasons of the Diamonds being spoken of this way. You see how terrified every Gem is of the Diamonds, whether they worship them or despise them. 

And then we found out a) Rose Quartz was one of them. And b) that Steven is one of them. 

Hey, quick question–anyone remember what Sapphire said, right in front of Steven, after the reveal?

Sapphire: Of course she was a Diamond. What a long road she took, to torture us all like this...

…Yeah, we never really got his feelings on b, did we?

I think Steven was so overwhelmed by everything else that was going on and everyone’s reactions, and later so eager to jump on the chance that being seen as one of the Diamonds gave him to fix the corrupted gems and help everyone, that we’ve never really seen him process this realization. Steven drew a very clear line in the sand. The Diamonds are the Diamonds, and Steven is Steven. The Diamonds are wrong about everything, so they’re also wrong about him being Pink, the same way everyone else in the series who’s called him another name has been wrong. He’s not Rose Quartz. He’s not Pink Diamond. 

Except…that second part isn’t true. Sure, Steven has a human body. Sure, Steven’s not the original Pink Diamond. That doesn’t mean he’s not a Pink Diamond. 

But it was easy back then, right? Because Steven was so, so different from them. A Crystal Gem. A defender of fusion. Weak. Small. Human-colored. Harmless. And as Steven says in the finale promo:

I don’t hurt people. I help people.

Yeah, there’s no way that building an incredibly black-and-white mindset with impossibly high standards for himself to create and hold on to a sense of identity was going to backfire.

So yeah, we never really saw Steven process that he was supposed to be one of these terrifying rulers. Except now he’s hurting people. In fact, it seems that all he can do is hurt people. And since he’s only able to see the bad things he can do, the amount of horrible power he has and how isolating it is and how terrifying it is–of course he blames it on what’s always seen as the source of so many horrible things. 

No wonder he’s having an identity crisis! He’s always told himself that he’s different than the Diamonds. He’s better than them. He has to be. So if he’s doing everything wrong, if he’s a freak, if he’s a shatterer, than it’s because he’s a Diamond. He’s just like them. He’s just as bad as them. He’s just as much a monster as the Diamonds are.

It’s complicated, what’s going on. Steven’s very, very wrong. But he’s also, strangely, right on target.

The thing is, this isn’t happening because he’s a Diamond, it’s because he’s human. He’s experienced trauma while growing up and is trying to react to it in a very human way. He literally has PTSD and CPTSD, and if you’ll look up the symptoms you’ll see he’s showing all of them. He’s not a monster. He’s part-human, so his symptoms are manifesting in partially inhuman ways. And that means he just happens to have the power to do a lot more damage than other humans when he lashes out in a way that is, once more, very characteristic for humans. But you know, even the best of humans can do a lot of damage, too, especially when they never really get over trauma. After all, Greg sure did a number on Steven. 

The flip-side of this is that the hilarious irony of ancient magical rocks trying to treat themselves as perfect and inhuman alien beings has always been that, that in reality, they’re every bit as fucked up and human as humans are. That’s the whole point of the Crystal Gems and the Homeworld Gems. Remember back when Garnet seemed so perfect? Peridot seemed pretty alien and unfeeling at the beginning, right? Jasper, Topaz, Aquamarine, it goes all the way up to the Diamonds. 

The whole point of the Diamonds and why the old system was broken was that the Diamonds tried to present themselves as perfect beings without flaw, when in fact they were all just as much a disaster as every other Gem. Remember back when Rose Quartz was a flawless goddess? Yellow and Blue were terrifying when we first saw them, but then we saw them comforting each other at the Zoo. They’re literally just a screwed-up family grieving and dealing with the death of one of their own–White’s first appearance painted her as this terrifying and totally inhuman being above even Yellow and Blue, but in the end, every one of the Diamonds is a normal, flawed person…just vested with the power to do a lot more damage than most.

The thing about White, was that she was so sure she had to be perfect, that she had to make everything better, but in the end, the solution was just to…let go. Accept that she was imperfect, and live with the consequences of it. Let other people help her. Stop trying to fit into being something she’s not, and just let herself be who she is. 

Does any of this sound familiar?

All four of the original Diamonds had destructive powers. All four of the original Diamonds experienced a change and made a conscious choice to control themselves and try to stop using their powers to negatively affect others. White Diamond might be stuck being White Diamond, but as “Homeworld Bound” made clear, she’s also the only one who gets to decide what that means.

So you know what?

You can call Steven half-Gem and half-human, but that doesn’t really describe what he is. He’s a human with a Gem. A Gem with a human form. None of that’s good or bad. It is what it is. And as much as it sucks to be different from everyone else, he’s also the only one who gets to decide what being different means to him. Steven Universe isn’t Rose Quartz and he’s not his mom, but just like he’s a human, he’s also Pink Diamond, and that isn’t bad. 

And I think that’s what he needs to hear from everyone. The solution at Steven’s birthday party wasn’t to react to the situation they were in and cheer him up the same way you’d cheer up a baby. He wasn’t just a baby, he was Steven stuck in a body that he didn’t know how to control. What he actually needed was to hear from Connie that she wanted to be there for him, no matter how strange he was. 

He needs the people he loves to stop telling him he’s “better than” his trauma and his diamond powers, to stop freaking out at how much damage he can do or treat it like a problem to be fixed. To not tell him that they know he’s going through, they’ve been there, too. They haven’t, and that’s not what he needs to hear. He needs to hear that none of what he is is bad. That his loved ones will be there for him and will love him unconditionally. 

And I think that’s what will allow him to accept himself; accept that if he’s a Diamond then he’s also a human, if he’s human then he’s also Pink Diamond–and, just like the previous Pink Diamond, he’s the one who gets to decide what that means.

TL; DR I actually really hope diamond eye Steven is permanent for non angsty reasons. This kid needs to stop being ashamed of his identity.

[talesofafangirlwithadvr]

JULY PICKS!

You heard me correctly, I said JULY! Whoosh, this year is going by fast-but not in a good way if you know what I mean. This will be my last monthly wrap up where I am strictly staying home in quarantine as this upcoming week I’m heading back to work in person. Wish me luck!

We had quite the range this month from newly released, reality, musical and then some favorites from last month that I’ve continued watching. Without further ado here we go....

There’s going to be PLENTY of SPOILERS this go round. ESPECIALLY with my first pick of Stargirl. You’ve been warned!!!

DC’S STARGIRL

I need to talk about 1x10 or I’m going to burst!!! As stated above there will be A LOT of SPOILERS IN THIS POST!! So scroll down to the next picture if you don’t want it to be spoiled. 

You’ve been warned...again.

IT CANNOT END LIKE THAT!!! ARE YOU KIDDING ME???? Henry! Wow! 1) Epic fighting 2) The backstory and how he wasn’t going to give up on his dad AND THEN how he wouldn’t give into his dad. 3) HE DIED RATHER THAN JOIN HIS SIDE OR PRETEND (which I honestly felt was going to happen). His character arc and I can’t believe it’s over!!! 4) His speech at the end: *weeping.* I knew Brainwave was going to say he killed his mother. It just felt like the build up. Brainwave Jr. would have been a GREAT ADDITION TO THE JSA! AND OMG THE WAY THE REST OF THEM FOUGHT FOR HIM! I loved how they framed it so you could still see them in the back when Henry spoke to his father. Super heartbreaking. Man, it feels like a lot of people have been killed off this first season (or am I just still thinking about Joey?) 

Side note: Check out the Instagram Live between father and son Brainwave on Stargirl’s CW page. Jake Austin Walker did an AWESOME interview in his take over.

This was one of the strongest episodes overall and definitely one of my favorites so far. I agree with many others that while it is SOO GOOD and I want to rewatch it again, I don’t know if I can emotionally yet. I can’t remember the last time I felt that way about a show. 

Some other thoughts this episode: WAY TO GO BARBARA! Way to record them to translate later (such an awesome app btw, how do I get it?). I’m glad her and Pat came more to an understanding because I love them especially with that glimpse into how they met. Jordan’s parents give me the creeps, like the couple from The Visit vibes. I feel like Mike’s got to find out ASAP, especially because he’s spent time in the garage. Something’s got to show him the truth; because I’m really feeling he figures it out rather than being told. Very curious to see what his reaction will be. SOLOMON GRUNDY. Thank God Beth talked Rick down. She really is like Chuck in being the voice of reason. She did really well in the cafeteria too. While I still don’t believe Starman is Courtney’s dad, how cute was it when she put together her and Henry were cousins? Speaking of Court’s dad, who else didn’t feel like Starman was her dad until they saw that upcoming promo? I don’t know who that impostor is but he is not her dad. Something’s fishy.

Loving this show. So happy it’s renewed for a second season!! 

THE 100

From a show I can’t get enough of to one whose final season is a disappointment. I’m not going to spend too much time talking about The 100 because I feel I’ll just be repeating myself from previous posts. However, I did want to include it because I haven’t spoken much about the previous 2 episodes that I wound up watching back to back and I didn’t overly dislike them. 

As many have complained, when you have a final season you shouldn’t introduce SO MANY new characters and just push aside your originals (or the ones who are left). You also shouldn’t include so many confusing plots that are making it look like were the main points overall (like this many world concept was around since the first grounders) and playing with time in so many episodes is hard to keep up with too. Having so many people separated makes it difficult to remember what just happened to this specific group because I haven’t seen them in forever. ANYWAY, I did promise some positives. I didn’t except to like 7x08 because of it being a flashback episode with brand new people that was just going to feel like a potential spin-off pilot. Well...I actually really enjoyed it and the concept that the bunker was used before One Crew. The characters were easy to like and it was cool seeing Allie again (and this time not as the villain). While it felt forced including the orb (is that what it’s called? If not that’s what I’m calling it), but I liked how all the other pieces fit together (ex: the flame, the grounders’ language). Honestly, I surprise myself to say this, but I’d watch another episode. For 7x09, I liked being on Bardo and watching Octavia, Echo, Diyoza and Hope slowly get “brainwashed” I mean trained. We all knew it wouldn’t work for Hope and if I was them I would rather be on Sky Ring than Bardo (but then I guess I’d go crazy, so...) I enjoy the Octavia and Levitt relationship and would love them to work out, but if this show taught you anything it’s to be skeptical. I also want to shift to the Primes plot, just to showcase John Murphy for a second. THAT MAN! What a character development he’s had on this show. From the first season where I was like come on Murphy to now me awaiting his scenes. From cockroach to someone who won’t view himself as a hero. So good and something that is fantastic about this final season. They might have forgotten about other characters, but they’re doing it right by Murphy. 

Well, that was more than I was expecting. ;)   

THE CIRCLE

It feels like I haven’t watched a lot of reality TV this year, which makes sense because of our quarantine situation (but then again I’m watching World of Dance, but that’s a different because it’s more of a competition/dance show. I’ll stop rambling). The Circle is a reality ‘game’ show that could be easily completed during quarantine and social distancing because the contestants do not see each other in person. They each have an apartment in this complex and only communicate with each other on a social media platform called the Circle. The objective is to become the most popular and an influencer who gets power over who stays and who goes in the competition. There’s some side contests throughout, but most of the show is just people chatting through an insta messenger and trying to learn as much as they can. Alliances are formed and cat fishes try to thrive all for the grand prize of $100,000. (Wow, that’s a lot!) It is SUPER addicting and very funny. Having a voice-over narrator really makes it even funnier because she says what we’re all thinking. Just about every episode a contestant leaves and then is able to meet one other person in their apartment. It’s been cool seeing their reactions as oftentimes it’s someone they did not expect AT ALL. I can’t wait to finish it. If you’re a fan of Big Brother than this is definitely for you. Looks like there will be a second season, which I am excited about.  

THE BABYSITTERS CLUB

Jumping from one Netflix show to another. Released on Netflix on July 3rd, I tried not to binge it all in one day because then it would be over (and we still don’t know if there will be a second season yet). This is definitely my feel good watch for July. If you want something that’s a quick watch and just wholesome and fun to escape our current world than this is for you. I always felt so happy after watching and couldn’t wait to watch another. While I was familiar with the franchise--the 90s movie and of course the books (although I was more of a Babysitter Little Sister fan, so I was very excited to see Karen), you don’t have to have any knowledge of the Babysitters Club to enjoy this show. I was hooked just about right away by this new series shown by me watching the first three episodes back to back. I really like how they set up each episode with one girl as the main focus (just like in the books) where she takes over the voice-over narration. Great representation and made modern to fit in with our current times. The first example that comes to mind is when Mary Ann babysits Bailey who is transgender. I liked how Bailey says those are her old clothes while they’re playing. It’s shown in a way that explains the situation without feeling like a lecture. It fits so naturally into the episode. And then Mary Ann’s speech at the hospital is super powerful for both Bailey and herself. This is just one example of how well represented this show is. Extremely strong cast and actresses who are the proper ages. I also love the adult casting and how they threw in a Clueless reference from Alicia Sliverstone (who plays Kristy’s Mom). As someone who is writing for this age group, I really liked hearing and seeing how authentic this show is. 

FEEL THE BEAT

A Netflix original movie that has been on my list for a while that I just got around to watching. It didn’t come out too long ago. In the film, Sofia Carson’s character is a dancer who is a perfectionist. She gets on the bad side of a big NYC producer when she not only leaves her in the rain as she steals her taxi, but also knocks her, accidentally, off stage and becomes a viral video-this basically blackmails her in Broadway. This all happens within about the first 10 minutes of the film and the majority takes place back in her small home town (very Hallmark-like) in Wisconsin. While there her old dancing teacher wants her to share her Broadway wisdom with her young students. Meanwhile Carson has only been a chorus girl, so she doesn’t really have any. What draws her to helping the young girls is the chance to perform in front of a big choreographer that could get her to be the star she always dreamed of. The catch is that it’s the teacher dance in the childrens dance competition. While this might sound like a movie you’ve watched many times before, it was still worth it and a really fun watch. I think the kids really make the movie. They are adorable, funny and super talented. You feel connected with them really fast and want to see them succeed. I loved Dickie and how he joined the group. I think he was my favorite overall. I loved how inclusive the cast was here too (just like BSC) from a mixed race family, to single parents and even a student who was Deaf. It was great seeing the other actors sign to her. Carson’s character, April, can be annoying at times, but you understand it’s her character and something she needs to overcome. As I said before the plot may seem familiar, but the ending was something I didn’t see coming. Overall, wholesome, feel good and fun for the whole family. You can consider to watch while babysitting. (See what I did there??)  

VIOLETTA SEASON 2

She’s back! I know last month when I included Violetta it was mainly me being excited to see the second season FINALLY streaming on Disney Plus. I had watched a few episodes (remember there’s 80 altogether, so even if I watched 20 that’s still very early on and just a dent in the season) and was still getting used to this season. Well, now I’m happy to report I am in the 40s and more than half way. For a bit I was watching many of these episodes a day, which told me that I was loving it again. Recently, I feel I need a little more of a push to watch, but it’s mainly because of certain story-lines that feel like they’re dragging. (For example: Violetta’s voice. One minute it’s fine and the next she’s like dying). For this section I have two words: LOVE TRIANGLES. And I’m not just talking about Violetta, Diego and Leon. For a bit it felt like each character had their own love triangle, which honestly I was loving. These characters have definitely developed a lot from last season, which allows this to happen. Olga was in a love triangle, which just recently got resolved. I think German is still in one because of his alter ego Jeremias. Jackie was “kind of” in one. For her it was more of a misunderstanding, which is very classic on this show. Lots more secrets have been uncovered in these episodes as well as songs! You know how excited I am for those. Overall, I think I’m still enjoying season 1 songs more (which get referenced enough in this season), but some of the season 2 ones are really growing on me. Specifically Leon’s Entre dos mundos and when he sings with Diego Euphoria in English. Also, Yo Soy Asi has been real catchy. I know Frederico will be coming back soon and I can’t wait to see him again!  

HAMILTON

Like many I watched Hamilton this month-actually on the day it came out. It’s been a musical that I’ve been intrigued by, but never thought I’d get a chance to watch because of how popular and expensive it is to see on Broadway. So, I was very excited to hear I’d get the chance when it was to be released in theaters for a special event. Then because of Corona it was released to Disney Plus, which was EVEN more convenient and exciting. I really enjoyed it and watched it twice within the same week. I immediately downloaded the playlist and started singing it around the house. I do this a lot with many of the plays I see, but depending how good they are is shown by how long I listen to the soundtrack. (Some of my top ones are Bandstand, Once, Newsies and Anastasia.) Because there are so many songs in Hamilton it is taking me a little longer to know all the words, but I feel pretty confident with the first act. It was the perfect timing for this to be released on Disney Plus. Not only because it was July 3rd, but also because of the world we are living in. Lin’s diverse cast brings to life the world of 1776 and the revolutionary war (as well as the time after it), but it’s such a strong commentary on our world today. This is something I am continually noticing with historical dramas/pieces being released within the last 5-10 years. It feels like there’s more we can say in this genre than in a commentary piece. I also like all the analysis videos I’ve seen popping up, which just make it even more powerful. (Like it being Eliza’s story and her putting herself back in the narrative. That the play Hamilton is named for both her and Alexander.) I don’t know if all of what I see were intentional, but  either way well done. I hope it doesn’t leave Disney Plus soon. 

1917

And lastly, 1917. I promised quite the range this month and you can see that’s definitely the case. I always enjoy watching war films and with 1917 there was so much hype (both before it came out and after) that I was interested to give it a watch. Giving the movie to my dad for father’s day felt like the perfect excuse to be able to watch it. Even though our DVD stuck in a few places (still don’t know if it was the player or the DVD itself), the film was very entertaining and I would suggest it to anyone who is a history/film buff. Taking place in WWI, we follow two British soldiers as they attempt to deliver a message about an upcoming ambush that could take countless lives. I feel that I often watch more films revolving around WWII, so it was very interesting to be immersed in the first great war. After watching I am not surprised that the film was up for so many Oscars. While cinematography is the first thing everyone discusses when it comes to this movie (and it should be because the one shot/long shot is sooo impressive and beautiful to watch. It really brings you into the scene and has a way of making you feel like you’re there too. There’s a realness to it that’s raw and new compared to other war films I’ve watched in the past), there’s so much more to this film too. First, I like how it connects back to Sam Mendes’ grandfather, so while it’s not a true story it has real facts in it. I LOVE the score and music to this film. In the scene where George Mackay runs at night through those ruined buildings I could really hear how well the music worked with the action. Because of this I made sure to listen to some of the soundtrack and now I’ve added some of the songs into my writing playlist. I have chills just thinking about it. The other point I want to bring up is the cast! While there are SO MANY big names in this film from Colin Firth to Benedict Cumberbatch, the two main characters are played by George Mackay and Dean Charles Chapman and they are the ones with the most screen time. If their chemistry and acting wasn’t so great then the movie wouldn’t be as successful as it is. Because of this I have been watching non-stop YouTube interviews of the two of them for this film. 

They are so well-spoken, stand-up guys and I can’t get enough of their dialogues with each other and others. (You should watch these interviews too). While familiar with Chapman’s time on Game of Thrones, I haven’t seen him in much else, so I’m excited to see what he’ll have in the future (as well as checking out his IMDB page). For Mckay, I’ve seen him before when I just watched Ophelia earlier this summer so that was my first time watching him act. After that film I was curious what else he was in, but it was only after 1917 that I started doing more research. So far, I’ve only been able to watch the short film he was in called Infinite. While only 17 minutes it was very strong and deep. I highly recommend. As I’ve shared on this page already, in another post, the more I hear him talk the more of a crush I am developing. It’s been a long time since I’ve experienced a celebrity crush this strong so soon. This quarantine has to end so I can make it to England to just casually bump into him like one does. :) 

[theydontknowaboutusimagines]

Outside the Rain - Harry Styles Series (Part 17)

Part 16

“Hottest Couple of 2019? Y/N and Harry Styles have been photographed together a lot this year. The first time was during the Rock ‘N Roll Hall of Fame where both were there to honor Rock Legend Stevie Nicks. The two were then seen together at the Met Gala and the Gucci Cruise Show over the summer. They were both seen at the VMA’s, where Styles was not performing or nominated for an award. While the two didn’t sit together, they were seen at the same after party. Most recently the two were seen in LA, first Harry was seen attending Y/Band’s/Name’s concert, and then again arriving together at the after party. A few days ago, they were photographed leaving a cafe with Y/N’s famous drummer father, and her songwriter mother. 

While they could simply be just friends, it seems they are extremely close. We’ve reached out to both parties and are still waiting on a comment regarding the status of their relationship. But what we can confirm is that we are here for this coupling and are ready to declare them the Hottest Couple of the Year!” 

**

Meetings, meetings, interviews, and more meetings. That is what your schedule and life had entailed over the last few days. The album would be coming out soon and you all were going over the promo plan. When you received your schedule for the remainder of the year, you couldn’t be happier at seeing some dates in London and the UK. You just hoped that Harry’s schedule worked out for those dates. 

Speaking of Harry, it had been almost a week since he left, and while you were distracted with work during the day, at night it was strange coming home to an empty house. What’s even stranger is that that used to be your norm. It never phased you before coming home and it being silent or that you’d cook dinner for just you. But after having Harry here off and on over the last few months, it changed what you were used to. 

Even though you and Harry had only really been official for a little under six months, you couldn’t help, but wonder what the two fo you would do once you two moved towards the moving in stage. Of course, that was a long away, especially since you’d be going on tour for the majority of 2020, even if you wanted to move in together, that wouldn’t be an option. 

After the photos of you and Harry leaving the restaurant with your parents, dozens of articles were written up and posted online. All of your and Harry’s fan accounts quickly started reposting the pap photos and photos from the events you two had attended previously. There were also accounts that were bad to prove your relationship was fake and being used for publicity. 

You weren’t exactly shocked by this, it happened all the time, but it felt like this relationship was thrown out into the internet more than any of your previous relationships. You had the day off, so you decided to head into the city to go do a spin class and get run some errands before doing things around the house to get ready for the start of promo season. 

You had an assistant that helped with most stuff, but there were a few things you still wanted to do yourself. You had just finished your class and sipped on a green smoothie as you walked around the city. You looked at your phone for a bit before looking back up and when you looked up, you saw something that caught your eye. 

Black posters with the words, “Do you know who you are?” written on them were plastered up on the wall. 

You took a picture with your phone before sending it to Harry with the text, “Excuse me, but what the fuck is this? No heads up for your girlfriend? Rude! ;)” 

You shook your head with a laugh before taking a quick selfie and sending it to him too before heading to your next stop. By the time, Harry replied to you, you were back home, unloading the contents in your bag. Your phone rang as Harry facetime you and you quickly answered it. 

“Do you have something to tell me?” You smirked as soon as you saw his face on the screen. 

“Surprise! My single’s dropping Friday!” He cheered into the camera. 

“Isn’t the whole point of being your girlfriend is knowing these types of things beforehand?” You laughed. 

“So, that’s the only reason, huh?” He raised an eyebrow. “It has nothing to do with my charm, handsome face, talented, gentleman qualities, or the sex?” 

“Yeah, none of that,” you joked. “So, I take it you’ve decided on Lights Up for the single?” 

“I have,” he nodded. “That’s why I was in Mexico filming the video.” 

“The video you still won’t let me see?” you laughed. 

“I’ve got to keep some things a surprise,” he laughed. 

“Well, then I guess I’ll be keeping some things hidden from you too!” You smirked. 

“No fair!” He groaned. 

“It’s extremely fair!” you laughed sticking a chip in your mouth. 

“Anyway, so how’s the meetings been going?” He asked. 

“Great,” you said. “I got my schedule for the rest of the year and there are some dates over in your neck of the woods.” 

“Really?” He smiled. “When?” 

“Well, you’ll just have to wait and find out,” you joked. 

He laughed shaking his head. 

“Are you going to have any promo coming up?” You asked taking the phone out to the backyard. 

“Yeah, Jeff and the team is getting everything finalized,” he said. “There’s some talk with SNL.” 

“Oh, fun,” you smiled. “Musical guest?” 

“Actually, double duty,” he said. 

“No fucking way!” You gasped. 

He smiled, “Yeah, I’m shocked. It’s still in the works and a date hasn’t been set yet, but it most likely will happen.” 

“Okay, I really hope it’ll be when I can be in New York,” you said. “I can’t miss that.” 

“I hope you can be there, too,” he smiled. “But I’ll understand, if you can’t.” 

“So, have you seen all the articles about us?” You asked. “Apparently, we’re the Hottest Couple of the year.” 

“Well, I mean, we kinda are,” he joked. 

You laughed, “I miss you though. I know it’s only been like a week, but it’s weird you not being here. Suddenly this house feels huge.” 

“I miss you, too, baby,” he sighed. “And it’s weird knowing you’re so far away.” 

“At least we’re in the same boat together,” you smiled. 

He nodded, “That we are, that we are.” 

**

It’s a few days later and you were currently at a video shoot in the middle of the night. You were tired, your legs were swore from dancing, and it was starting to get a little chilly. But it was nice being surrounded by people during the late hours instead of being home alone. While you were waiting for your next take, you sipped on hot chocolate, trying to warm yourself up a bit. 

“Why did we agree to this?” Rachel groaned. “I’m freezing my tits off!” 

“It could be -25 degrees out here and your tits would still be well intact,” you laughed. 

“Hey! It’s not my fault my mother gave me these,” she laughed. 

You giggled, “But in all honesty, we were going for the aesthetic this brings.” 

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” she mumbled taking a seat next to you. “So, when are you going to give me some details?” 

“Details?” You asked. 

“About you and Harry! We haven’t heard many updates recently,” she said. “How’s everything going?” 

“We’re great,” you smiled. “We’re really happy and enjoying our time together.” 

“I’m glad,” she smiled. “I know I say this every time, but I’m really happy you two met and you were willing to give him a chance.” 

“I am, too,” you smiled. “I don’t think I’ve ever been this happy in a relationship ever or this soon.” 

“Well, it could be that you’ve finally found the one, babe,” she smiled. “It won’t always be easy, but it’ll be worth it.” 

A few hours later, you were finally finished with the filming and able to head home. You were practically dead on your feet and were happy you had previously arranged for a driver to pick you up. When you got to your house, you got out of the car and practically dragged yourself down the driveway. 

You put your keys in the door to unlock it and as soon as you were inside, you shut the door and dropped your things. When you walked further in, you noticed a large bouquet of roses on the kitchen table that weren’t there before. To say you were a little freaked was an understatement, but you were so tired, you didn’t really think anything of it. Maybe those were already there and you just didn’t remember. 

You grabbed some water from the fridge and headed upstairs, ready to undress and slide into bed. Luckily, you were off in the morning and could sleep in before your lunch meeting. When you got up to room, you heard something coming from the bathroom. You stopped in your tracks, trying to figure out what it was or who it was. You held your phone in your hand, ready to call the cops, in case it was someone who broke in. 

There was a shoe nearby, so you grabbed it as you walked over to the door. The door wasn’t shut all the way letting you open it without whoever was in there hearing you. The sound of the sink turning on confirmed that you weren’t just hearing things. You pushed open the door, closing your eyes, and throwing the shoe in the person’s direction before rushing out into the room. 

“Ow! Fucking hell,” you heard them groaned. 

Just as you were typing 911 on your phone, Harry walked out into the bedroom, with only a towel around his waist while holding your shoe in the other hand. 

“Uh, is there a reason you hit me with a shoe?” He laughed rubbing the top of his head. 

“Is there a fucking reason you just showed up at my house in the middle of the night without telling!” you groaned. “How was I supposed to know it was you and not like a robber or something?” 

“Well, if I was, you’re first choice of taking me down was a shoe?” He asked. 

“It was the first thing I grabbed!” you groaned. 

He laughed walking over to you, “I’m sorry, I scared you. I was hoping I’d be done with my shower before you got home. I was going to greet you at the door.” 

You wrapped your arms around him, “Seriously, I can’t believe you’re here right now,” you smiled. “I mean you are really here, right? This isn’t just me being sleep deprived?” 

“I’m really here, baby,” he smiled, kissing your head. 

You smiled looking up at him, “How’s your head?” 

“I’ll survive,” he laughed. “But you on the other hand, look like you’re about to pass out. Let’s get you into bed.” 

“Oh, would you?” you laughed jumping up into his arms. 

He laughed holding you with one arm, “Only if you kiss me first.” 

“Don’t have to ask me twice,” you giggled pressing your lips against his before he carried you over to the bed. 

[onomatophia]

My Heart’s Been Borrowed and Yours Has Been Blue

Characters: Haruno Sakura, Uchiha Sasuke Pairing: SasuSaku

Summary: “Hey, do you want to get married?” Sasuke asks casually as if they’re out walking leisurely in a park instead of being in the middle of a fight with rogue ninjas. (Blank period SS, fluff)

—

“Hey, do you want to get married?” Sasuke asks casually as if they’re out walking leisurely in a park and not in the middle of a fight with rogue ninjas.

And okay, that’s not exactly how he wanted to propose to the love of his life. Sasuke may suck at this romance thing but he knows well enough that proposing in the middle of a battle while sounding nonchalant about it isn’t exactly one for the books. 

In his defense, he did spend a lot of time thinking and planning how to propose months before this. It’s just that today, fighting with Sakura, her having his back and always making sure he’s not severely injured and simultaneously taking down their enemies with just a single punch to the ground just left him in absolute awe. Suddenly, he was hit by this sudden urge of wanting to marry her and keep fighting enemies with her until they grow old that his throat just closed in on him and the words stumbled out of his mouth. How he kept calm through it all, was a mystery to him as well. 

Sakura throws a punch effortlessly at an enemy running toward her before replying, “I don’t think now is exactly the best time for that, Sasuke-kun.”

It’s been a year since they left Konoha and started to travel around Fire Country. The past year was spent in bliss, learning each other and falling in love all over again. Getting acquainted with each other didn’t really take that much time because of the history they shared and before they knew it, they’ve already familiarized themselves with the other like the back of their hand. It certainly wasn’t long before they stopped the pretence of having to sleep in separate rooms or tents and decided that sleeping together was inevitable and long overdue.

They complement each other so well that they only have to share one look and they’d immediately understand what the other one is thinking. Sasuke thinks that if he had taken Sakura with him in his quest for revenge against Itachi years ago, maybe he would’ve accomplished things sooner. 

If Sasuke were a better man, he would wax poetic right there and then of how he couldn’t live without her, how she’s the sunshine of his life, how he’s never loved anyone as he much as he loves her, and how he probably wouldn’t bear it if he ever loses her. Even after having moved on from his past and having rid of his lust for vengeance, he is still not well equipped to handle these things called ‘emotions’. 

And because he’s Sasuke and he’s an idiot, he just points to a nearby establishment with an ad that says “50% OFF PROMO FOR NEWLYWEDS!” written in pink ink and inside a heart shaped wreath. “We should take advantage of that promo,” he says as he throws a couple of shuriken to their enemies jumping out from the trees where they were hiding. 

Sakura aims another kick at the ninja running toward her before she turns to him, mouth pressed in thin line. “You’re saying you want to get married just so you could enjoy a luxurious night in an inn?” 

He just shrugs, “That and the tax benefits, I guess.” His mouth twitches as fights off the urge to smile.

Sakura just rolls her eyes at him and blows the bangs off her face. For someone who’s fighting a dozen or so ninjas in the past hour, she looks absolutely pristine as if she just started her day and Sasuke might just pass out because she’s so pretty it should be illegal. 

“Okay,” she shouts as she jumps away, dodging the series of kunai thrown at her by their opponents.

“Okay?” Sasuke blinks. 

“Eh, I suppose you’re not bad in the eyes. And I could do with your fortune inheritance, I guess.” Sakura retorts to which Sasuke snorts. “We better finish off these thugs as soon as possible so we can still make it to the government office in this town then.”

—

By the time they reached the town hall, it is almost sun down. They both look disheveled with their clothes all wrinkled and smudged with dust, not exactly the perfect attire for a wedding. The offices are about to close and night establishments are starting to open.

The civil servants are just about to leave and so Sakura had to resort to deception just so the town official would officiate their ceremony.

“Please, I beg you. I only have a few weeks left to live and I don’t want to waste any more time that I have left not being married to this man,” Sakura chokes out, letting the tears flow down her face. And to add to the dramatics, she then buries her face in her palms and wails her lungs off. 

Sasuke had to suppress the urge to laugh as he sees panic-stricken face of the town official. 

The man, Zenitsu-san, raises his hands in defeat. “Fine, fine. Just stop crying. I will marry you both right here, right now.” He then walks back to his office while grumbling not-so-discreetly, “Goddamnit, I hate this job.”

Sakura’s face immediately breaks out with a grin when she glances at Sasuke and starts pulling him by the hand to follow the town official, her excitement evident with every skip in her steps. Sasuke had to hide his smile because he just knows how dopey he looks right now and he can’t have Sakura seeing that because he’s got a reputation to maintain.

However, he stops her right before they enter the office when he is suddenly reminded of Naruto’s wedding. He puts his hands on top of her shoulders while Sakura stares at him, confusion written all over her face. “Sasuke-kun?”

Sasuke takes a deep breath, “Are you sure you want to do this? We could go back to Konoha, you know. Have our wedding as grand as Naruto’s if you want. I want you to be with your family and everyone important to you on our wedding day and-”

Sakura cuts him off with a kiss before he could finish what he was saying. “Sasuke-kun. You’re my family and the most important person in my life.” She then smiles at him, a smile reserved only for him, and places her hands above his. “Whether it be in sewer or in a dump site, I don’t care. I just want to be with you.”

Sasuke really, really, really loves this woman. He must’ve done something great in his past life to deserve her, to have someone like her love him unconditionally after all the stupid shit he pulled.

He was about to lean in and kiss her when he was interrupted by a loud groan coming from inside the office.

“Really? Really? You haven’t even signed any marriage application forms and you’re already kissing the bride? God, get your asses in here and fill up this forms so I could go home already. Ugh.” Zenitsu-san whines. 

— — — — — — — — — — —— — — — — — — — — — —

                            Certificate of Marriage

This certifies that Haruno Sakura and Uchiha Sasuke                             were united in marriage

             on the 30th day of July in the year 1980

— — — — — — — — — — —— — — — — — — — — — —

Sakura held up their marriage certificate in one hand as her other hand is currently occupied holding Sasuke’s hand while they walk to the direction of the inn they saw earlier.

“That was surprisingly quick,” Sasuke comments.

Sakura nods then proceeds to roll up their marriage certificate. “Well, it is way past his work time so he was rushing us. And apparently eloping is the trend nowadays, according to the grandmas I gossiped with around town. So the government had to be efficient as more and more couples are doing this.”

After filling up some marriage application forms and presenting their identification cards and birth certificates, the town official proceeded to marry them in his office with his secretary and a janitor as their witnesses. In just a half hour or so, Sasuke finally attained the greatest achievement of his life; marrying Sakura Haruno.

He is now a husband. He can now refer to Sakura as his wife. Holy shit.

“Ah finally, we’re here!” Sakura exclaims and enters the inn with Sasuke in tow. Sakura then brandishes their wedding certificate to the woman in the reception area. “We want to avail that 50% promo now.”

The woman smiles at them and hands out a pamphlet to Sakura. “Good thing you were able to avail our promo as we only have it until today.”

It was then that Sasuke saw the banner from their earlier fight, “50% OFF PROMO FOR NEWLY WEDS! UNTIL JULY 30 ONLY! (Includes a romantic dinner, spa, mud baths and other activities!)”

Sasuke narrows his eyes at Sakura, “Is this why you are adamant that we get married today?”

His wife just smiles cheekily at him, “What? You’re the one who suggested this in the first place, old man.”

“Can we get the key to our room now?” Sasuke asks the receptionist and practically hauls Sakura in his shoulder. He’ll show her who she’s calling an old man. 

— 

Sakura practically melts into the pillows and the blanket after Sasuke gently laid her down the bed who promptly joined her.

“I thought I’d be getting some action after all that,” Sakura says.

Sasuke gathers her into his arms and buries his face in the crook of her neck, “Mmmm so tired.”

Sakura pats his head and laughs, “Ah the ripe old age of 22, where our bones creak and our backs ache.”

They stay like that for a while, reveling in each other’s presence and feeling content with everything when Sasuke suddenly raises his head as if he remembered something.

“I forgot,” he says as he fumbles in the pocket of his pants.

Sakura just frowns at him and then gasps when Sasuke pulled out a small black velvet box from his pants. It doesn’t take a genius to know what’s inside that box.

Sasuke opens the box to reveal a simple ring with a gold band and a small emerald diamond in the middle. Simple and subtle, like their love for each other. He takes it out of the box and gathers Sakura’s hand. “Can I?” 

Sakura nods, tears welling from the corners of her eyes.

“Sakura Haruno, is it okay if you spend the rest of your life with me?” he asks quietly while slipping the ring on her finger.

Sakura just laughs as the tears fall from her eyes, this time they were real. She caresses Sasuke’s face and looks at him fondly, “I can’t believe you would propose just after we got married.”

Sasuke wipes the tears from her face and hugs her once again, “Just covering my bases, is all.” He then turns off the lamp next to their bed and settles them both in a more comfortable position. He yawns, “Good night, wife.”

Sakura sighs contentedly and burrows her face in Sasuke’s chest. “Good night, husband.”

—

Notes: Anyway, I have no idea how civil weddings work. I’m just basing things from the tv shows i’ve watched lol. And I don’t know Sasuke and Sakura’s exact wedding date so I just put on the first date I could think of which was Harry Potter’s birthday haha.

[venus-says]

Yes! Pretty Cure 5 GoGo Episodes 25-37

They finally changed that awful ending theme, YES!

I have this thing while watching Precure weekly where at some point during the third quarter I start to get tired of the season, this doesn't happen always but more often than not during this time of the show my fire starts to burn out. And I feel like if I had watched GoGo while it was airing this burn out would hit me for sure because I do think this is the weakest point of this season.

The feeling I had while watching this was that nothing really relevant was happening, even though we actually had quite a decent amount of events moving the story. It's that just most of these events were happening in episodes that weren't very memorable or eventful, we also didn't have a climax for this quarter which made it feel like most of the stuff was meaningless. Also, different from the first and the second quarter, this one didn't have an episode that stands out as a sign of this portion of the story and these are all things that make this the less interesting part of this season so far.

We didn't have a lot of fillers, but we had a lot of what would be considered important events happening in episodes where the main plot could be considered filler, and this is the feeling I have for this quarter, it was the "filler arc" even though we didn't really have an immense amount of fillers if we think about it.

Episode 25 introduces new villains and we have Queen Bavarois' departure, then we have the filler in the big city followed by a summer festival episode. Next in line, in episode 28, we're introduced to the next monarch, Princess Crepe, and the following episode marks the debut of another general. We reach episode 30 which is another fairy tale episode but that introduces the new toy that will give Milky Rose's power-up in the next episode, which also crowns Nuts as a rightful ruler since he finally gets to use the power of the crown. Then there's a couple of filler episodes, one to showcase the new general's power and one filler for Urara, and we're already saying goodbye to Princess Crepe in episode 34. Episode 35 is the "last" filler of this arc, and we close this quarter with the two-parter that serves as the climax for this section of the story.

As you can see, a lot happens, yet it doesn't feel like it, it doesn't feel like we had any significant progress outside of Milky Rose's new attack. Does this mean the show became bad and that I stopped enjoying it? No, one of my favorite episodes of this season is here, but again, in comparison with the previous 24 episodes, these 12 feel pretty week.

Talking about the fillers, Episode 26 was a bit weird, it was fine but I still don't know if by the end the people of that city really believed that precure were real or if it was a tv/promo thing for the parade. 32 was the pinnacle of filler episodes because by the end I was like "okay, seeing the girls shrunk down was fun, but why was that for...? What was accomplished here by doing this?". 33 was cute, it's good to see the girls interacting with other characters from school that aren't secondary characters, but by the end, it didn't feel very special. Then we have 35, that seems like it would be a strong emotional episode about the girls wondering about their future and everything, but that is kinda put in the background in order to give Bumbee of all persons a focused episode and it was just weird. And for last, there's episodes 36 and 37, that were supposed to be our climax for this part but that honestly are more filler than anything. They don't really add much to the story, it was just a game show thing for the sake of it, it didn't change the status quo, to be honest, it didn't even have to be a two-parter IMO, it was fun up until a certain point, but they dragged it way too much.

Thankfully, filler land wasn't just a bunch of mediocre stuff because we had the glorious summer festival episode where we can see the combo Komachi and Rin working together again and IT'S FUN AS HELL!! I gotta say, after Yes! Komachi didn't leave that much of a big impression on me, but in GoGo I'M LOVING HER! She was amazing in this episode, from being quirky because of her love for scary things to the smartness to find a way to walk through that world, to her kindness in trying to help Rin overcome her fears, she shined brightly. And once again, she used her Emerald Saucer in another creative way that brought a lot of fun to the fight and that reiterated how versatile mint is as a cure, Again, marvelous episode.

Going to villains, my opinions on Shibiretta and Bumbee remain the same, they've been consistent with what we've seen so far. The biggest thing for the villains was the introduction of not just one, but three new generals at this point of the story, given that we haven't seen much of them I don't have any strong opinions on Yadokan and Isogin, they seem pretty bland and I'm not invested on them but I like that they go all out and they didn't reserve what I believe is their fully beast form only for their final appearance. The more expressive addition to the cast is Mucardia, who's very different from all previous generals we had, I like how his approach is through using disguises and everything, it reminds me of Shitattare in this aspect, and I'm here for this. We also had a kind of a confirmation that the Director had something romantic with Flora or something on those lines from one flashback/dream sequence we had in one of the episodes. Now, the only thing I haven't enjoyed from the villains is Anacondy, I don't like how they're making her someone who's obsessed with a man, I think I was fine with her rivalry with Shibiretta because it could be something of the likes of her feeling threatened of losing her position, but here they made it more obvious that she has feelings for the Director and I really don't like that, especially since they also show her having some level of attraction to Mucardia, I think this goes too much to the route of "this strong woman NEEDS a man". And I think they could let the Mucardia stuff be present, but having her be in love for the Director it just feels like a cheap move.

With Queen Bavarois back to her kingdom, we're greeted with the monarch for this arc, Princess Crepe. And I have a lot of problems with her, to begin is her personality, she's the basic ojou-sama archetype but that is a bit extra delusional because of her love for Coco, she's also the monarch we spent the least amount of time with, I believe, and in this short amount of time we had very few instances where we could see her real personality because the show was more concerned in making her another rival in love for Nozomi and Milk, so it's hard to get to like her and because I don't like her whenever they try to make an emotional moment for her, it just doesn't work.

Now to close this post, let's talk Nuts. I'm glad the show addressed the fact that he was feeling useless, because well... he was, and I like that they gave him his mini-arc of about 3 episodes or so because he was really needing it. I just wish the groundwork had been set in a better way, the steps for his arc here are he sees a laptop in episode 26, in episode 29 we see him drawing the plans for the communicator, in episode 30 he finally builds it but he can't make it work, and then episode 31 is about him putting out there his frustration, showing his determination and being able to summon the power of the crown to give Milky Rose her new weapon and attack. My problem here is that it feels like it wasn't enough, like yeah those points were there, but we effectively only saw that affecting him in 2 episodes, it wasn't a good build-up.

And this lack of build-up also hurts Milky Rose a bit because we don't see Nuts and Milk/Kurumi having an extra bond, the only thing they had was when Nuts knew Kurumi was Milk before she revealed her identity, and again, that was only one instance of it happening. Also, the star of the episode is more Nuts than Milk, so for her to gain a new power-up from this sadly doesn't feel like it was deserved or earned. And I think the producers kinda knew that because instead of giving her something completely new that could make use of the Milky Mirror in the way it deserves, because it is a pretty cool weapon, they just made her old attack but with a different CG effect for the petals of her rose. It is a bit disappointing.

I think this sums up perfectly this third quarter, a bit disappointing from a series that was being consistently good, and I hope this quarter was just a fluke and that we'll end this season with a bang because I really enjoyed the first half of the series and it would be sad to see it sink down in my concept. But anyway, these are just my thoughts, I wanna hear what do you have to say about in the comments down below. Stay healthy, stay safe, never stop resisting, thank you so much for reading, and until the next time. See-ya~

[stevenuniversallyreviews]

Episode 93: Alone at Sea

“But why would a fish ever bite a hook?”

Something I don’t believe I’ve mentioned here before is that both of my parents are ministers. I myself am not religious (not because of trauma or anything, my folks are great), but I was raised in the Presbyterian Church by a mom and dad who often saw things through a “hey, that could be in a sermon!” lens, and that tends to rub off on a kid. Not to oversell the value of these posts, but it’s not lost on me that I ended up writing something to share with people every Sunday. I can think of worse people to emulate.

So it’s hard for someone like me not to notice that Gems take crucial steps towards becoming Crystal Gems through some pretty baptismal circumstances. I’m not saying the symbolism is intentional, because neither aquatic rituals nor the show’s crew are uniquely Christian—Rebecca Sugar, for instance, comes from a Jewish background—but we’ve yet to see a Gem fall in love with Earth without being reborn through water. Peridot first bonds with Steven in the rain. Ruby and Sapphire land on solid ground together in the rain. Pink Diamond and Pearl first realize they need to rebel as a storm brews.

And then there’s Lapis Lazuli. 

Lapis literally entered the series because Steven broke a mirror, so it’s no wonder she’s misfortune personified. Bad things happen to Lapis. Bad things happen because of Lapis. And sure enough, she might control the same waters that herald rebirth for other Gems, but she’s also consumed by them. Her old life can’t get washed away because she’s still submerged. So an episode about Steven trying to reconnect her with water is bound to be a bit more complex than a joyous scene in the rain.

Alone at Sea takes us to a dark place for Steven Universe, even compared to its preceding episode, the harrowing Monster Reunion. Plenty of bad things have happened to our characters, but for the first time since the Week of Sardonyx we must confront that one of our characters has herself intentionally done a bad thing. Not day-to-day meanness or misguided acts of loyalty to Homeworld, but something truly awful. Almost as if we’re priming for some big reveal about a core character’s moral ambiguity at the end of the season. 

This isn’t to say that Lapis, who also entered the series by stealing the ocean and battling the Crystal Gems, is a stranger to doing bad things. But there’s a gulf of difference between seeing magic antagonist stuff and the learning that she was abusive to her ex. Not many kids are gonna cause marine catastrophes, but way too many kids are gonna have to deal with abusive relationships one day, so Alone at Sea can’t help but feel more raw.

The first moments of the episode show that Lapis is more than her suffering; she’s capable of having genuine fun, especially with Steven. She hints at her deeper issues by insisting she doesn’t deserve to be treated nicely, but she’s just as quick to snort with laughter. And even after boarding the rechristened Li’l Lappy, she’s willing to give happiness a shot. While she’s uncomfortable about dipping her toe in the water, she still finds moments of joy (particularly when it comes to horns). But more often than not, this positive outlook is hindered by her crewmates.

Greg, bless him, hurts more than he helps. He introduces himself as the guy whose leg Lapis broke, his discomfort around her water powers stifles her floundering self-confidence, and he bores her to death with regular fishing. Likewise, while Steven means well, he’s overbearing in his attempts to make Lapis happy. As awkward as it is, I’m glad the show acknowledges how easy it can be to mess up when trying to cheer up a friend in the dumps. Despite Steven’s apology about pushing too hard, we don’t get an explicit lesson about paying attention to how your friends are feeling instead of steamrolling them with fun. This isn’t a criticism: it’s okay to not get explicit lessons all the time, and it’s a nice change of pace from the show’s recent string of episodes that outright tell us the moral, even though these morals are sound.

Everything comes to a head when the rudder is thrown off, veering Li’l Lappy and her namesake off course. Steven gives that apology, but Lapis reiterates that she doesn’t deserve his help, and this time we learn why: as brutal and bullying as Jasper is, in some twisted sense Lapis learned to love their toxic relationship, using it to take all her grief and rage out on Jasper. We saw a hint of her aggression in Chille Tid, but in Jennifer Paz’s best delivery of the episode, Lapis reveals that she misses Malachite. And right on cue, the opportunity to fuse with Jasper again reveals itself.

Jasper’s last lines that weren’t just shouting “YOU!” at Steven were all the way back in Jailbreak, but Kimberly Brooks is worth the wait. Her hungry correction that she was “looking for you” instead of the crew as a whole is perfect (the woman knows her way around second person pronouns), and she manages to become even scarier when she transitions from menacing to begging. All at once we see that Jasper is still monstrous, but has been changed by Lapis. Not in the way she’s saying when trying to convince Lapis to fuse again—there’s little indication that Malachite would be any healthier if she came back—but in the way this massive warrior is on her knees pleading to essentially be made a prisoner again.

From her debut, Lapis has been the most powerful being on Earth by a country mile thanks to her mastery of its most abundant resource. She effortlessly bested the Crystal Gems in Ocean Gem, and had the mental fortitude to overcome Jasper’s iron will and wrest control of Malachite. But only now, in Jasper’s pleas, does a character finally acknowledge Lapis’s power. It speaks volumes to their relationship, because it’s not just about control and manipulation: at some level, beneath all the toxicity, Jasper understands Lapis in a way others don’t. It’s not enough to make them a functional couple, but it shows that there’s an uncomfortable level of nuance even in relationships that are obviously bad. It would be much easier to write either Jasper or Lapis off as totally rotten, but Malachite wouldn’t work without a hint, however small, of real affection. 

Malachite made both Jasper and Lapis feel stronger, but they weren’t strong in the real way: they were suffering, and instead of trying to fix this problem, they each learned to like the suffering. And it might be easy to place more blame on Jasper than Lapis, because even here we see how manipulative and violent she can be, but Alone at Sea doesn’t shy away from Lapis’s complicity even when presenting her in a more heroic light. Steven doesn’t call her out on her behavior, but he doesn’t exactly correct her when she reveals how terrible she’s been.

Back in It Could’ve Been Great and Message Received, we got a taste of uncertainty in terms of Peridot’s future. Sure, a promo spoiled that she was staying with the Crystal Gems, but otherwise there was no telling whether she was a temporary addition. Lapis has the same quality, but amplified to a thrilling degree due to her rockier stance with the Crystal Gems. When I first watched Alone at Sea, I legitimately didn’t know what would happen next. Lapis was such a new and tenuous ally and had so much baggage with Jasper that it wouldn’t have shocked me if she had gone back to being Malachite, especially considering how underused Malachite ended up being. It gives the episode way higher stakes than, say, the Week of Sardonyx, where despite the turmoil you could pretty much guarantee that the Crystal Gems would come out of it okay. Lapis is fundamentally not okay, so anything could happen.

And that actual chance of returning to Jasper makes Lapis’s rejection so much more triumphant. She seems to sincerely consider Jasper’s offer, even when she sounds sickened by the prospect, but when given a true choice she’s able to see past her longing for that life. Malachite began with Jasper’s forceful “Just say yes,” and she can’t come back if Lapis says no. It might be alluring, but unlike Jasper, Lapis refuses to take the bait. 

I haven’t gushed about Aivi and Surasshu for a while, have I? I’ll be honest, a big part of that is that with the release of Steven Universe’s first soundtrack, the composers stopped releasing background tracks on the internet, and only several years later have these tracks finally popped up again. Access to their music got scarcer and scarcer, but I’m so glad that before it dried up, we got the instrumentation of this final sequence, because it’s really something.

As the clouds gather and she talks about her time fused with Jasper, we hear the buildup of Lapis’s darker theme, and the moment she reveals that she misses being Malachite, the fusion’s ominous two-note motif clangs just once. The track is soon overtaken by Jasper’s synth drum war march, with only hints of Lapis’s celesta leaking in (just like in The Return), but as Jasper begs to fuse again we get the very first quiet version Malachite’s motif (at 1:49, it’s so easy to miss); the fusion’s theme is no longer a force of nature, but a desperate plea. 

A piano rendition of Lapis’s theme drowns out Jasper as she considers her options. Strings build to the same fever pitch that we got when Lapis first agreed to dance, but they fade to a quiet conclusion as she refuses to go back to Malachite. Jasper’s drums make one last appearance as she lashes out at Steven, but Lapis’s counterattack is as musically calm as her rejection. Lapis could have gotten loud, dramatic variants of her theme for her one-two punch defending herself and then Steven, and it would have sounded awesome, but instead both big moments show that she’s shunning loudness for peace. Tying all these musical themes together is impressive enough, but that restraint ties the whole scene together.

Jasper is about to dominate the final arc of the season in a story that has nothing to do with Lapis, but everything to do with Lapis. It’s safe to say Jasper doesn’t handle their breakup well, and her collection of Corrupted Gems is less a matter of a soldier raising an army and more a jilted lover looking for acceptance after being abandoned for what’s likely the first time in her very long life. This is the first in a string of blows that knock Jasper down more than her fight with Garnet ever did: it’s one thing to lose, but it’s another to be rejected, and until Jasper learns to make a change, rejection is the only future she’s got.

Lapis goes right back to being an angsty teen after this, despite getting more comfortable around Peridot. But Alone at Sea makes me appreciate her eventual abandonment of Earth when the going gets tough again, because while it’s not the right thing to do, it makes sense that a character with massive unresolved trauma would follow the most defensive instincts possible to avoid further pain. I’m not huge on the show just saying Lapis did something awful and not following it up with much soul-searching, but she does plenty of work outside of Jasper and perhaps it’s for the best that she focused on less toxic parts of her life for self-improvement.

The big bummer of Lapis and Jasper’s story is that it never really resolves: even when Jasper halfway reforms, she and Lapis will never share a screen again, let alone have a conversation. I’m not saying I want a reconciliation, but apology is good for the soul, so I hope that someday Little Homeworld sees a moment where Lapis says she’s sorry for her part in Malachite’s agony, even if Jasper was worse.

Still, seeing Lapis refuse to re-fuse still works as a resolution to the episode, if not the arc. And she does work on her issues in other ways, even if Jasper doesn’t. But even though this is their last interaction in the series, admitting your mistakes and choosing not to repeat them is itself a noble step.

I’ve never been to this…how do you say…school?

She’s not even in the episode, but Pearl and her swim cap are the winner of this entry. Does nobody else care about their hair?

We’re the one, we’re the ONE! TWO! THREE! FOUR!

This is our second excellent feel-bad episode in a row. We may not ever get an acknowledgement about the abusive nature of Lars and Sadie’s relationship in Island Adventure, but at least we have this episode addressing the issue.

(Bear in mind I’m not champing at the bit for more abusive relationships in children’s media, but if you’re going to have them, I just think it’s irresponsible not to use them as an educational tool, is all.)

Top Fifteen

Steven and the Stevens

Hit the Diamond

Mirror Gem

Lion 3: Straight to Video

Alone Together

The Return

Jailbreak

The Answer

Sworn to the Sword

Rose’s Scabbard

Mr. Greg

Coach Steven

Giant Woman

Beach City Drift

Winter Forecast

Love ‘em

Laser Light Cannon

Bubble Buddies

Tiger Millionaire

Lion 2: The Movie

Rose’s Room

An Indirect Kiss

Ocean Gem

Space Race

Garnet’s Universe

Warp Tour

The Test

Future Vision

On the Run

Maximum Capacity

Marble Madness

Political Power

Full Disclosure

Joy Ride

Keeping It Together

We Need to Talk

Chille Tid

Cry for Help

Keystone Motel

Catch and Release

When It Rains

Back to the Barn

Steven’s Birthday

It Could’ve Been Great

Message Received

Log Date 7 15 2

Same Old World

The New Lars

Monster Reunion

Alone at Sea

Like ‘em

Gem Glow

Frybo

Arcade Mania

So Many Birthdays

Lars and the Cool Kids

Onion Trade

Steven the Sword Fighter

Beach Party

Monster Buddies

Keep Beach City Weird

Watermelon Steven

The Message

Open Book

Story for Steven

Shirt Club

Love Letters

Reformed

Rising Tides, Crashing Tides

Onion Friend

Historical Friction

Friend Ship

Nightmare Hospital

Too Far

Barn Mates

Steven Floats

Drop Beat Dad

Too Short to Ride

Restaurant Wars

Kiki’s Pizza Delivery Service

Enh

Cheeseburger Backpack

Together Breakfast

Cat Fingers

Serious Steven

Steven’s Lion

Joking Victim

Secret Team

Say Uncle

Super Watermelon Island

Gem Drill

No Thanks!

     5. Horror Club      4. Fusion Cuisine      3. House Guest      2. Sadie’s Song      1. Island Adventure

[catsncomics]

A Simple Theory

As the greatly anticipated release of the first issue of Heroes in Crises approaches, I would like to throw my hat in the ring with a few ideas and theories.

Now, before I go any further, a disclaimer: I do not follow any of Harley Quinn’s storylines, nor did I read Cyborg’s solo run. Therefore, despite my best attempts to research the characters involved, there’s a good possibility I missed an important clue.

Also, a warning for potential spoilers might be in order.

That being said, let’s dive right in, shall we?

First off, the “Marked Six” as I call them.

Due to solicits for the coming months, it’s safe to say that Kyle Rayner, Cyborg, and Harley Quinn are safe. So that narrows it down to Tim Drake, Booster Gold, or Roy Harper. However, I think the statistics given in DC Nation #4 are bit of a red herring.

On the surface, the odds do not appear to be in Roy’s favor. He was given a 5-1 chance of dying in HiC. His send off in Green Arrow and RHATO were quite ominous. It would be the obvious play. Bnd he’s been put through the wringer quite a bit already throughout his character’s history.

Roy’s battled addiction, been abandoned by his father figure and mentor, unknowingly sired a child then said child was cruelly kept from him, watched his first love Donna Troy die, had his child was kidnapped by a human trafficking ring, been shot five times in the chest (a wound that earned him a get out of jail free card from Deathstroke), and had his throat slit. Then, as if that weren’t enough, writer’s cut off his arm, callously killed his daughter, and plunged him back into addiction.

If Tom King kills off Roy Harper, I just… I don’t think there are words for it.

Booster Gold. He’s had an interesting run lately. Popping up in multiple titles. His odds are listed as 10-1, and I do think it’s likely he’s one of the two that will die. Some have said he’s safe because he’s been accused of committing the murders, but the two aren’t mutually exclusive. I think Booster is innocent, and his desire to be a hero will be what leads to him being the second major fatality in the story.

Timothy Jackson Drake. Tim. Tim. Tim. I’m going to miss you. But then again, I haven’t seen the real you since Flashpoint.

Yes. Despite being the long shot of these three with 25-1 odds, I think Timmy will definitely perish in HiC and his will be the first shocking death. How can I say such a thing? We haven’t seen hide or hair of him since Detective Comics #981. Nor is there any hint of his coming back in any future issues. His Rebirth appearances have been limited to one title. Meaning to remove him from the board again would not impact any ongoing storylines. Not to mention Tom King is all about torturing Batman right now.

What’s that you say? “They already killed Tim once. They won’t do it again.” The promo material continues to espouse the idea that the DC universe will be thoroughly shaken as a result of this series. How better to do that than to kill the someone everyone thinks is safe? The person they want you to believe is safe?

So who did it? If not Harley Quinn or Booster Gold, who is responsible?

Wally West.

“How DARE you?!” you gasp, clutching your chest in horror.

According to DC Nation #2: King did confirm that… heroes will change radically, and the DC Universe will never be the same.

The results of the Flash War left Wally thoroughly shaken. He’s experiencing flashes of a life that no longer exists. He was willing to do anything to reunite with his family. Wally is in pain. People in pain do illogical, irrational things. Sometimes those things lead to people getting hurt. Or killed.

I have two solid reasons for this outlandish accusation. First, the cover art of the first issue.

Wally is covering his mouth. Hand to mouth gestures are often the result of revealing too much information, or letting a lie slip, or come from the need for reassurance. Because Wally is the only one demonstrating this body language I suspect it falls more in the category of deceit than a self-comforting reflex.

Second, the cryptic line from Mr. King: You can’t have a Crisis without a dead Flash. There’s more than one way to kill a character. It would be the twist no one saw coming; if this Flash dies in the sense of becoming a fallen hero.

From the coming months’ solicits, we’ve learned that something’s gone awry with the AI and computer systems at the Sanctuary. Which is where I believe Cyborg plays a part in the story. His mother box has the ability to access and override non-sentient machines. Infiltrating, the AI would be a walk in the park for him. I think he play the role of an accomplice of sorts to Wally.

Before I go, I would like to put one last offering on the table. One that’s a bit… out there. I think Dr. Manhattan might be involved somehow.

Hear me out. Several of the key players in HiC have already drawn his attention or have the potential to pose a threat to him. What better way to remove those who could stand in your way than to take them out when they are vulnerable? And if they all happen to be at same place at the same time, even better.

Tim Drake was sequestered outside of space and time by Dr. Manhattan. Why?

Because he was “reconnecting threads that should not be reconnected.” He was “so loved, so deeply intertwined. It became crucial that (Dr. Manhattan aided by Mr. Oz) take (Tim) off the field.” At his last sighting, Tim was heading off to investigate the existence of diverging timelines. Doesn’t sound like his experience in that extradimensional prison really posed as much of a deterrent. Perhaps Dr. Manhattan has decided Tim needs removed permanently to keep him making those connections.

Kyle Rayner has tangled with a mysterious entity that was most likely Dr. Manhattan.

While attempting to resurrect the Blue Lantern corps, a “presence” interfered and fractured the White Lantern ring. An “intruder” of power beyond anything they’ve ever encountered. His previous ability to master the seven rings and wield the White Lantern ring has probably put him on Dr. Manhattan’s watch list.

Cyborg’s Element X laden mother box grants him a deep connection to the multiverse. As a result of the Flash War, Hypertime has been shut off to the Flashes. However, Cyborg was able to access it through his mother box during the Metal event.

He may now be the only one who can. This definitely makes him a potential threat to the Doc.

As for Booster Gold, the writers have stated plain as day that he’s at risk because of Dr. Manhattan: Time travel has become more deadly, what with Dr. Manhattan and the ongoing events of Doomsday Clock. Buddy, there’s only room in the DC Universe for one person playing god with time. This also shows that the doctor is on their minds when it comes to the events of the this story.

“This is nonsense! Dr. Manhattan has nothing to do Heroes in Crisis. You’ve gone off the deep end.”

Probably. I’m most likely completely way off in left field. But it never hurts to throw things against the wall and see what sticks. Who knows? Maybe I’m right: Wally makes a deal with the devil (Dr Manhattan) to get his family back. He beseeches his old pal Cyborg to hack the AI system of Sanctuary as part of the master plan. But it all goes terribly wrong when Tim Drake discovers what he’s up to. Booster and Harley are the natural suspects because Wally would never do such a thing. Harley is the first one to connect the dots because she thinks outside the box. Booster tries to make things right by going back in time, but Dr Manhattan stops him and puts an end to his time travel for good.

What do you think? Who do you think is guilty and who won’t survive?

[precuredaily]

Precure Day 049

Episode: Futari wa Precure 49 - “Believe in the Future! Believe in Tomorrow! You Can’t Make Us Say Goodbye!!” Date watched: 1 June 2018 Original air date: 30 January 2005 Screenshots: https://imgur.com/a/RuN2VIg

This is it. The end of the end. This is the culmination of the series and of the three-part finale. It’s just the Precures, the fairies, and the Dark King. They’ve beaten him once before, but now he has the Power of Creation, so this fight is on an all new level.

Before the fight really starts, Dark King casts a shadow over the world that I guess causes everybody to disappear? They seriously have never explained this phenomenon, sometimes people are asleep and sometimes entire populated areas are just vacant. For once, Nagisa questions it and the King responds that he’s simply setting the stage, if they want to restore everybody they’ll have to defeat him..... IF they can defeat him.

At first, the girls mostly get thrown around. They summon the Rainbow Braces but even the Rainbow Storm is nothing before the Dark King’s might. When all hope seems lost, Porun taps into his inner power and contacts the Garden of Light. The Queen tells him that the power inside of him has matured and if he wants to save the girls, he knows what he has to do. Porun steps up and faces the Dark King himself. The king attempts to squash him but Porun begins glowing like the sun and rays of light poke through the dark clouds, centering on him. He starts radiating a power that weakens the Dark King and reinvigorates the Precures to a level previously unseen. Porun collapses back into his laptop form, completely exhausted, and the cures come up and thank him for his help. They then perform the most powerful Rainbow Storm they’ve ever done, so strong that even the Dark King is unable to resist it. He tries, he fires the power of destruction at them, and for a moment it looks like he’ll overcome them, but the girls push back. He tells them that defeating him is impossible, and they respond with the most beautiful comeback: “Even if we know it’s impossible, when there’s something that must be done, we do it!”

They grip their hands tighter, they begin glowing with the power of light, and the Dark King is overcome by the power of the Rainbow Storm. With his last breath, he condemns the Queen before he is destroyed and the power of the Prism Stones scatters. The city returns to normal and nobody remembers what just happened. From his perch on a rooftop, Kiriya secretly thanks Nagisa and Honoka for showing him how the power of light can overcome any obstacle, and he also disappears into a puff of sparkles, as all darkness has been eradicated.

;_;

That night at Honoka’s house, the pair are discussing their journey when Honoka’s grandmother comes over to congratulate them on their achievement. They’re confused until she clarifies that she’s talking about them graduating to third years at school, but we know that she knows. After she walks away, Mepple and Mipple tell the girls that they’re getting tired and are going to go to sleep forever now, because they’ve chosen to stay in the Garden of Rainbows with their friends. Porun still hasn’t woken up from his ultimate powerup either, and now it looks like he never will. As the girls flash back to their first meetings with their partners, many tears are shed, both in and out of the show.

We skip forward to spring, it’s the commencement ceremony for Verone Academy. The third years are moving on to high school and the underclassmen are moving up a year. Honoka is chosen to read the valedictory speech, and she starts to read it, but puts it down and instead gives her own heartfelt speech about the importance of school, making friends, and all the memories they’ve made at the school with the help of those who are graduating. She thanks the graduating class for everything and congratulates them. All the while, a new insert song is playing: “Beautiful World” by Uchiyae Yuka, and it really is a beautiful song, I’ve linked to a YouTube copy of it right there so give it a listen, and if you want to read her entire speech I captured it in numerous screenshots in the gallery.

After their ceremony, Honoka and Nagisa are walking through the city when Honoka sees something that shocks her. Nagisa stops to look too, and it’s revealed that a boy that looks a lot like Kiriya is buying a drink from a stand a level below them. He has brown hair and brown eyes, but the resemblance is uncanny. He notices the girls staring at him and looks back. Everybody stares in silence for a while, before the boy shrugs it off and runs off to his parents. We’re left to wonder if this really is Kiriya’s reincarnation, or if it’s just a coincidence. The last spoken line of the episode is Nagisa reassuring Honoka that she and Kiriya will be able to meet again someday, and we close on a shot of the Prism Stones safe and sound in the Castle of Light.

That’s fine, I didn’t really need my heart anyway.

Also the next episode preview is a promo for Max Heart that shows Mepple and Mipple awake again, so that kind of undercuts the impact of them going to sleep forever.

This episode is great. Everything about it is great. From the cures’ declaration that they’ll never give up, the payoff to a half season of Porun’s character growth (remember how I hated him at the start?), the Dark King being destroyed for good, the heartfelt graduation speech Honoka gives, the genuine sadness at losing the mascots forever (even if you know it’s not forever, while I may have a heart of stone I’m not unmoving)... I could probably gush for hours about everything I like about this episode. And when I do the series write-up, I probably will. But for now let me say that this is the perfect finale, except for the lack of setup for Max Heart which has to do a little bit of retconning to make its setup work, but oh well. My understanding is that they were too far into production of the concluding episodes to rewrite them when they learned they were getting a sequel, which is why it ends how it does.

I don’t know how many ways I can say that I love this show. Is it perfect? No. I’ve documented a lot of flaws throughout the show, and that reminds me, here’s one more:

The Dark King’s CG model is awful. He looks like he was rendered in 240p, he’s very blurry and at one point I even saw the swirling effect on his “skin” reset. Like the animation was a loop but it didn’t loop back to where it started, it starts in one spot and ends in another and then restarts so the changeover is very obvious. His low-texture render has stuck out to me since the first episode he was in and I know I’ve pointed it out before but I really feel they dropped the ball on this one. I guess I’ll elaborate more in the overview.

I haven’t commented on the use of music in this series nearly enough, but I can’t think of much to say. There’s some really catchy themes that are used well but I’m not so good at analyzing that as I am at analyzing writing and animation.

Pink Precure Catchphrase Count: 0. No “Arienai” that I remember, sadly.

Next time, I’m going to reflect on the entire series, what worked and what didn’t, everything I can think of, and then we’ll jump into the sequel!

[stylesdimplefeelings]

Heartbroken and Alone(Whipped Series)

I figured it’s time to put a stop to title-ing any follow up as “Whipped” anything since y’know, Harry can no longer express how seriously whipped he’s been.

So I’ll start by apologizing for not title-ing this Whipped Ex PT7.

Anyway, I want to take the the time to thank every single one of my lovely readers for being so patient and not killing me over the lack of updates!/.^

YOU’RE ALL GREATLY APPRECIATED AND LOVED!!!!

"'Ave ye' heard, love? Julia's pregnant. 'Aving another little one." Harry breaks the comfortable silence, a grin wide on his face as he averts his attention away from his phone screen and to his girlfriend who'd settled herself in between his legs and on top of his body. 

"Is she?" Y/N's eyes widen in excitement, brows arching as she turns her head to lay her chin on her folded hands that rest atop Harry's chest. 

"They 'aven't publicly announced yet. But yeah, baby number three s'on its way."

"Hmm," she hums in thought, pressing her ear to his chest, the steady thumping of his heart sending her into a sudden comfort, "what do you reckon we should gift them?" 

Harry's brows furrow, tongue poking out in thought as his fingers lightly begin to trail her spine from the arch of her back, up to between her shoulder blades and back down. 

He's looking at the top of her head absentmindedly, noticing the way her body seems to raise and fall at the rhythm of his breathing. 

"Wha' about a crib?" He questions, halting his movements on her back and bringing his phone back up to eye level, fingers working to search up cribs on Google.

He's scrolling through endless pictures. Wood brown cribs, white cribs, grey cribs, cribs with slats, some without. All pretty, some not traditional and with drawers worked into them. And he must admit, looking through beds for little teeny-weeny babies gets his heart all fuzzy and warm.

"What're you smiling at?"

Y/N's moved her hands to lie under and wrap over his shoulders, gazing at him curiously, a finger lifting to poke at his dimple.

Harry hums at the feeling, but says nothing, just takes a quick glance to meet her eyes, his nose scrunching cutely at her. 

"Not gonna tell me?" She whispers, chin now poking into the top of his chest. 

Her mouth moves to press a gentle kiss to his chin before pulling back slightly. And when Harry doesn't respond at all, she kisses just under his chin, nibbling at the stubble he's been growing for a few weeks. Though it prickles her lips, she stretches her neck further to press more kisses every time Harry tilts his head back to avoid her pecks.

"Not gonna stop till you tell me!" He's wiggling under her, head tilting to the opposite side every time she tries to kiss him, until she's poking her tongue out against his chin.

"Did ye' jus' lick me?" Harry looks at her accusingly, and his laugh rumbles against her chest as he brings his hand up to wipe at the slightly damp spot. 

The sight of his Y/N trying to hold back a laugh has him narrowing his eyes at her before his own tongue is licking her forehead.

Y/N giggles at that, flattening her palm on his forehead and moving it upwards to push his hair back.

"What's got you smiling like a dolt, H?" 

Harry clicks his phone off then, looking down at her intently, hands locking over her lower back and sock clad feet rubbing against her own bare feet.

"M'just 'appy tha' you're 'ere."

Harry's always been quite sappy, but if she's being honest, this sort of catches her off guard, doesn't really know what's got him saying that.

"I've always been here silly." She chimes, 'booping' his nose with her index finger.

Harry spreads his hands over her back, rubbing up and down once and then bringing his right to wrap around the back of her neck. He presses into it to bring her face closer so he can kiss her forehead.

He exhales audibly, the hand that was on her neck now working to push her hair back with the back side of his fingers, tips brushing her shoulder.

"But m'appy to have ye' like this, pet. To m'self," he whispers, "all t'myself."

Y/N's sure she's never felt this happy before. And she really doesn't know what to say to that, doesn't think there are words that'll express just how happy she is to be here with him. So she smiles warmly at him when he starts to hum to the tune of "Songbird," and watches his hooded eyes close completely, a smile creeping onto his lips as he runs his hand down her back and rests it on the curve of her bum, thumb slipping under the hem of her shirt and rubbing circles on the hot skin. 

"Harry?" He thinks he wouldn't have caught if it weren't for the fact she's so close to him.

Harry can hear reluctance laced in that simple word, and when he opens his eyes, he's met with a timid look, a look that tells him her mind might be tittering on whether she should continue or not.

He smiles reassuringly before whispering, "Yes, love?"

"You love me, right?" 

Harry cracks a smile, appalled she would even have to ask at this point. 

"G'na love ye' til I die," his words get muffled into her hair, "m'gonna be good t'ye and m'gonna love ye'. Never g'na do anything to jeopardise that, pet. Promise." 

It was a promise she didn't know she'd needed. A promise Harry thought was implied in their relationship, something he didn't know he had to audibly say. But it seems to put her at ease by the way she relaxes further onto his body, an ear pressed to the right of his chest.

They continue to indulge in each other's company, nothing but light huffs falling into the silent air. 

"Loved ye' for a long while now," he admits, though he's sure he's said it before, "not g'na stop."

He feels the curve of a smile on his skin as she reaches up to take his cross necklace between her fingers, moving it in a way that it slides on the chain.

"Good." 

***

Y/N doesn't remember how long she's been stood still, with the moon and the stars shining through her kitchen windows like spotlights. But it feels like forever. It's felt like forever since the breakup. Days seem to drag longer, nights feel shorter than usual, and she can't recall the last time she's had a nice long sleep. 

If any of her friends were to ask - which they have - she's been doing rather well. Doesn't deny that it didn't falter her any, but she's aware time will heal her wounds. She'll spit lies about how she's been preoccupied with work enough that her mind's able to function normally. 

But in a quick reality check - which she can thank her wandering mind for - she'll remind herself of Harry's betrayal. 

That's how she seems to have ended up sobbing in her kitchen. 

She had let herself enjoy her own company - maybe a little too much. She'd prepared a bubble bath when she'd gotten home, but was quickly reminded that Harry had gifted her the luscious bombs when she walked back into the bathroom and caught a whiff of the lavender scent. Without further knowledge to the inviting bubbly water, she'd retracted from the room and shut the door all too hastily, leaving the bubbles to deflate until the water was nothing but a soapy lilac coloured puddle of memories. 

She was beginning to get better at blocking out any thoughts of him - or so she'd tried to convince herself. Plenty times she'd caught herself turning off her telly because 'shit. Dunkirk promo's started' and she knew there was a chance she'd catch a glimpse of him even if she was clicking through channels. And no matter how quick she'd be to click it off, it would surely send her into a haze she'd much rather avoid. 

But tonight. After a month of working on picking herself up, it all caught up with her.

She was stumped after having walked down the empty hallway to her sitting area, enough that she didn't think twice when her eyes caught sight of the bottle of wine she'd long forgotten two nights ago. She gripped the neck of it maybe a little too harshly, completely throwing the idea of pouring it into a glass out the window and wrapping her lips around the opening. Tilting her head back, she'd taken a long swig, brows furrowed and eyes screwing shut in hopes of silencing her mind and any thoughts of Harry. 

She'd wiped her lips with the back of her hand after they'd detached from the bottle and slumped down on the sofa. 

Slowly - through every chug and every gulp - she'd begun to get light headed, sight becoming blurry and body growing tired.

She'd reached for the control and turned on the telly absentmindedly, barely paying any attention to the program displayed across the screen. 

But she never realised at what point the interview began. And frankly couldn't comprehend why it had taken her so long to turn it off after the imagine of him processed through her mind. 

It sobered her up some, enough to bring her to her current spot at the kitchen window. Tears free falling down her cheeks and eyes stinging from not having bothered in taking off her make up. She made no effort in silencing her sobs. This is her home after all. A place she can be vulnerable, even if it's only to herself. 

She lets the recent image of Harry imprint into her brain, unable to deny that although the sight of him made her heart literally hurt, it also made it melt. It's as if she was conditioned to feel nothing but happy when she saw him or heard his voice or even caught the mention of his name.

It's not until her ringtone for Gemma sounds that she snaps her head in the direction of the sitting area. Walking over to her purse but not necessarily tripping over herself to answer the call. 

She inhales deeply before pressing the green button and lifting the phone up to her ear, wet cheeks causing the phone to slide down slightly only for her to readjust after wiping at the damp skin.

She lets out cough, hoping to steady her voice so that it'll sound more as if she'd been asleep rather than crying. 

"Hey, Gem." Complete fail.

"Y/N! Love," and it's as if she was actually surprised she'd picked up, "haven't talked to you in a while. How've you been?"

Y/N's been close to Gemma the second Harry had brought her over to their childhood home for a birthday party. She'd found herself confiding in her like you would a best friend. Harry had often been at the center of their conversations, and it was actually Gemma who'd at one point called it that her baby brother would end up with Y/N. 

So Y/N thinks she understands why Gemma would be surprised she'd answer her call. One would think she would have ignored it like she's been ignoring Harry's. 

But all in all, Gemma's not the person Y/N would've gone to crying over Harry. Not her, not Niall, not Grimmy. And as sad as it is to admit, having made friends with Harry's circle of friends led up to be heartbreaking. It was a given fact she wasn't going to reach out to any of them after what happened. She wasn't going to be the person that would strain those friendships, wouldn't take any pity from them. And in all honesty, wasn't going to make Harry look bad in their eyes, no matter how much he deserved it. 

"I've been better," she admits, voice low and timid. 

After that, Gemma tries her best to comfort her. She tells Y/N her how she wishes she had given her a call after it all happened. Tells her over and over again how it didn't matter that Harry was her brother, he'd been a proper dick and she would have smacked some sense into him if she'd known. All in all, she just couldn't believe Harry had cheated. 

She also talks about how miserable Harry's been, moping about their mum's, spending more time inside than she's ever seen him do. She tells Y/N how it breaks her heart to hear her baby brother silently crying on the sofa at night when he thinks everybody's gone to sleep. And Y/N notices how not once Gemma mentions that Y/N should forgive him, only wishes she gets better and assures her that anything she needs, all she has to do is call.

When the call ends, Y/N tries so hard to hold back the fresh tears rimming her eyes. 

She couldn't bring herself to think of Harry being miserable. Of a broken Harry sulking over the mess he'd made. 

Many times she'd been there to ease his mind and worries, to calm his sobs and lull him back into her Harry. A kind Harry that saw the world for more than what it was. 

But now, she's suffering. And he's suffering. 

She fiddles with the phone in her hands, a picture of Harry towards the upper left corner of the screen, his contact number screaming out at her. 

Her thumb lingers over the digits, mind saying no, but heart contradicting it. 

What would she even say to break the ice? Maybe she could start by congratulating him on the film? But then what? The second that phone rings, there's no going back.

And she knows she can't speak to him, not when she's this vulnerable, not when the sound of his voice might just have her braking down in tears for the third time today.

Maybe she shouldn't. Not after it all. She doesn't want to be that person. The one that so easily forgives the people who've wronged them. But haven't they both had enough? Haven't they suffered more than needed? More than they should have? 

But a simple congrats doesn't mean anything more than congrats. She's not taking him back for Christ sake. She's overthinking it, but she just wants to tell him she's proud. 

Her thumbs swipe over the keyboard swiftly. 

"Congratulations on the movie, Harry. Hope you're doing well." 

Send.

[twdmusicboxmystery]

Beth Greene was Always Gimple’s Sheriff

 Good morning Everyone! Please prepare yourself for some epic parallels! This is a bit lengthy so grab yourself a warm beverage and settle in for a few minutes.

This post is based 100% on potential, unconfirmed spoilers that were posted this week. I normally wouldn't do a post on something that's unconfirmed, but I believe very strongly that the spoilers are correct. Why? Because even though it's not something we ever theorized before, they fit in perfectly with Beth's narrative. They connect EVERYTHING across four seasons and are yet more evidence that Beth's return is only a few episodes away.

Everything is below the READ MORE for those who don't want to be spoiled. So if you don't want potentially massive spoilers for this season—and kind of the rest of the series?—do NOT read this post. You've been warned.

Okay, so if you want to read the spoilers in detail, look at THIS POST that I put up last night. The gist is that they're pretty sure Carl is dying in the MSF. That totally sucks! I'm still heartsick about it. And again, the spoilers aren't confirmed so I HOPE their wrong, but I don't really believe they are. The reason is that we actually have tons of evidence for it, which I'll lay out in this post, but that we just never noticed before.  

Most of my fellow theorists have asked me if I saw this coming, because none of them did. And the answer is no, I didn't. I don't think anyone did. Even if something struck us at suspicious at one time or another, we just didn't think Gimple was ballsy enough to kill off Carl. *Sigh* I guess if we haven't learned by now that he's ballsy enough to kill off absolutely ANYONE, it's our own faults.  

The fact is that now, every evidence we've ever seen for Beth that involves Carl can now be seen in a new light, and makes SO much sense. I'm going to argue that this isn't about Chandler going to school. Gimple has been planning it this way since season 4, and I'll prove it to you.  

So let's start there. Let's go through various things that were probably foreshadows of Carl's death, but we just didn't realize it.

Season 4:

4x16: A

The sheriff's hat. In the famous scene where Rick puts the hat on Beth and calls her the "new sheriff in town," it falls off Carl first. It's so subtle, but it's probably a foreshadow not only of his death (no longer wearing the hat; because why else besides being dead would he ever stop wearing that hat?) but also that Beth was never going to return and take her place as sheriff until Carl's demise.  

Also keep in mind that we saw Negan knock that hat off Carl's head twice last season. Once in 7x01 and again in 7x16.  

4x03: Isolation

There's a scene where Carl and Hershel go outside to collect berries so Hershel can make tea for those who are sick. I've always connected this scene to Beth (X). The reason is that they see a female walker who's leg is in a bear trap (Bear Symbolism). It just feels very Beth-ish. Imprisonment. Parallels to Beth stepping on the small game trap in Alone. Oh, and Hershel doesn't allow Carl to shoot the walker, which is a parallel to TF not shooting or stabbing Beth to make sure she wouldn't turn.

Interestingly, there are some callbacks to S1 in this scene. A walker sits against a tree much like Jim did when they left him in S1. 

And then there's an empty tent which is a callback to looking for Sophia (which is actually season 2). 

The Sophia tent I understand because it's part of the "missing girl" theme, which we've seen around Beth a lot.  

But I never understood the S1/Jim reference. I never knew what the point of having that in the scene was. Now I do. In S8, when Beth appears (walker in the bear trap) there will be some season 1 stuff going on, which we are now seeing very heavily in S8, and will continue to see in 8x02. If you've read spoilers about the "familiar face," you know what I mean.  

So here's how this relates to Carl's death. Carl is very much the sheriff in this part of the story. Everyone is sick, Daryl/Michonne and co have left to go to the veterinary college, and when Rick and Carol leave to canvas for supplies, Rick leaves Carl in charge. That's why Carl insists on going out with Hershel, to protect him.  

So we're seeing a parallel of this now in S8. When Michonne said in 8x01 that this was Carl's show, it means that he's in charge, much as he was in this scene from S4. Even though Michonne is there, Carl is the sheriff. There's not a specific death omen in that scene that I can tell, other than Carl's general fatalism, but let's keep going.

After the prison falls, Rick has a heavy Beth parallel because he falls into a mini coma and sleeps for more than a day. Carl can't wake him up. So once again we see Carl being "the sheriff" by going to look for supplies on his own. He does assert his own independence and even yells at Rick that he would be fine if Rick died.  

But the thing is...it's not true. Later that night, Carl starts to cry and say he can't do it by himself and he was wrong. Now, this is one of my favorite Carl-centered scenes. I've always seen it as beautiful and sad and human, so I'm not knocking it in the least.

But we do have some interesting juxtapositions here. We sort of see Carl's weakness, in that he can't be by himself. And yes, he's a kid and you can't reasonably expect something like that from most kids, but most other characters could have gone on without Rick. Even at Carl's age, Daryl would have been just fine, lol. Meanwhile, we have these Rick/Beth parallels of being in a coma, not able to wake up. Carl even comes close to shooting Rick, but doesn't. Then Rick wakes up from his mini coma and is fine.  

I'm not even saying I see a specific death omen here. Just that it's interesting. Carl's weakness along side a sheriff awakening from a coma.  

Season 5:

5x02: "You are not safe." This speech from Rick to Carl was even in most of the promos. Now, granted, nothing happened to Carl right away, but I think it's significant that it was said in S5, not long before Beth is shot. It's a foreshadow that eventually, something might happen to Carl. Rick says, “It only takes one second. One second and it’s over.” Sounds pretty ominous.

5x08: Deleted scene from Coda. The one where Rick and Daryl talk on the roof.

I'm SO side-eyeing this scene now where Carl is concerned. We TD-ers have always seen it as a sweet moment between Rick and Daryl. One of understanding and solidarity. It's Rick's way of telling Daryl that he understands that Beth and Carol mean as much to him and Carl and Judith do to Rick, and that Rick will back him up with whatever needs to be done to keep these women safe.  

But now look at it in terms of Beth returning just as Carl dies. Everything Rick has done since S1 has been about keeping Carl safe, and of course Judith is part of that too. Rick actually tells Daryl that here. Then, right after, Daryl loses that person (Beth) that meant so much to him.  

So what we're seeing is a theme about Daryl getting Beth back just as Rick loses Carl. I'm not sure I’m illustrating this very well. It's crazy-intricate.

Think of it this way: Rick has almost lost Carl many times (S2 shooting, his humanity in S3/S4, shot in the eye in 6x09) but Carl has always come back from these things. Carl has gotten many returns. (Everything gets a return). Beth, of course, has not. So Rick has had a great deal of time with Carl, and much of it is miraculous because Carl SHOULD have died in most of these situations, but didn't.  

So Rick talked about doing anything to keep his kids safe. Then Daryl lost his person. So when Rick loses HIS person (Carl) in S8, mirroring Daryl's loss in S5, that's when Daryl's person (Beth) will return,

So in 4x16, the sheriff's hat falls off Carl and Rick picks it up and puts it on Beth. New sheriff. New arc. New hope. New loss.

5x08: “I get it now.” This has less to do with Carl, but what is only a short time later, Beth stands in the hallway of Grady toe to toe with Dawn. She says, "I get it now," which is all about her future leadership. I've always said this shot of her between Rick and Daryl shows that she'll rise to be a leader of the group on par with both of them. (Details HERE.) But it's means more than that now. She'll actually take over as leader for Rick and lead beside Daryl. (I'll explain that more in a minute. Bear with me.) So we have evidence of her leadership, right before Daryl loses her in a way that was referenced by Rick, only in his case it was about Carl and Judith. See what I mean? Holy crap!

5x16 Conquer: Can we please appreciate this shot one more time? Carl, Judith, and the music box. Just like Carl, Judith and Beth were all present in the flashback scene of 4x16. I'd never actually connected these two shots in this way before, but holy cow!

Season 6:

Not tons to add here. It IS important that Carl protected Judith when the wolves showed up, and that he and Enid are kinda paralleled with Bethyl off and on. Making more sense as to why now.  

6x09 – No Way Out  

I already talked about Carl being shot in 6x09 and Rick really freaking out when he was sure he'd lose him. (Foreshadow anyone?) But I'm also kind of thinking about Denise now. We've already established how monumental her parallels to Beth were. So I'm just side-eyeing the fact that she worked on Carl and saved him. Yes, I know she's the doctor and who else would have worked on him, but they didn't have to parallel her so heavily with Beth. And once again, while her "saving" him might suggest that Carl lives, it's really an anti-parallel.

It's actually a lot like the Deer Theory. When the deer lives, the character dies. When the deer dies, the character lives. (Wonder if we'll see a deer around Carl's death at all.) This is similar. Carl lived after being shot in 6x09. And Denise is a Beth proxy. Denise died only a couple of episodes later. So when Beth is revealed to truly be alive, Carl will die.

6x16 –  Last Day on Earth

Now check out what Carl says to Rick just before the saviors start whistling and surround them. "We can do anything. And we will. What happened to Denise. I'm not gonna let anybody die like that again."

Whoa? Seriously? If Denise = Beth, then when Beth lives... See what I mean? So I was thinking that maybe Carl would die protecting Judith. But maybe he'll die protecting Beth? No idea really. Either way, I think he'll go out as a hero, protecting someone. It also suggests that whoever he protects will be in danger of dying like Denise. A crossbow bolt to the head? If that almost happens to Beth but doesn't, it will be ultimate validation that we were right all along about Denise parallels.

Season 7:

I already mentioned that Negan knocks the hat off twice, which is pretty huge. 

(Negan/Carl’s Hat Gif)

Also, in the second lineup in 7x16, when Negan is going to kill Carl, Carl looks up at him and says, "You won't win." That was one thing that was always suspicious to me. And no, I never actually thought they would kill Carl. But even so, I always felt like he was being a little too accepting of his own death, rather than fighting it.  

So now is probably a good time to mention this next thing as well. I firmly believe that they use death fake outs and close calls as foreshadows of actual deaths down the line. We certainly saw it with Glenn. He had death fake outs in both S4 and S6, and then eventually we did lose him. Same thing with Carl. His "almost" death foreshadowed his actual one.  

Of course it's nearly impossible to pin down who will go next or when it will happen because 1) Every character has had close calls and could potentially die at any time and 2) they move so slowly that even if a character is dying in a few days, it might STILL be two seasons away, lol.  

Season 8:

So remember in my Details and Foreshadows post about 8x01, I talked about 1) Michonne saying this is your show, which I said is a theme we've seen before and is always equated with death or the missing girl. This just goes to show how Beth's arc is tangled up in Carl's, and again, if he's the sheriff, then she's about to appear, just as the walker with the bear trap did in 4x03, at the same time as the S1 callbacks.  

2) Then there's what that Savior said to Rick about how he would beg, and his son would still die. I didn't think Carl would die when I heard that. Only that there would be death in his arc. Wrong on the first count, right on the second. The death in his arc will be his own.

So the idea is that Rick's Old Man Coda is just like the picnic dream in 7x01. It's his vision of a perfect, peaceful future, but someone in it (Carl) isn't actually alive in reality. I think this story telling technique is fascinating because they introduced it to us in 7x01 so we'd be familiar with what it is. They're using it again, but this time they aren't telling us who died. It will be revealed slowly as we go along.  

The second flash forward, of the Rick with the red eyes beneath the cross, is most likely Carl's funeral.  

The other foreshadow that I didn't even mention in my previous post is when Rick tells Maggie that when the war is over, he'll follow her. That could symbolically point to Beth (that he'll be following a Greene sister) but really I think it's both. Just because Beth leads doesn't mean Maggie won't still lead Hilltop in some capacity. Or it could just be a general foreshadow that Rick simply won't be leading anymore.  

One more outside-the-show evidence? I was talking to my buddy @paolo_pedini (IG) about this. He told me that he wasn't surprised Carl is dying, mostly because Comic Book Carl is so different than TV show Carl. I don't read the CBs, so I wouldn't know this, but he told me that the two are so different, he's never understood how TV Carl will ever get to be CB Carl. And he doesn't mean it as a knock on Chandler's acting. Not at all. But the vibe is just different. In the show, Carl is very Glenn/Hershel/Beth-ish. He's very compassionate and all about helping people. And in the CBs, he's just not that way.

Now granted, at any point, Gimple could feasibly do a story line for Carl that would change his outlook and attitude toward life, but he's been on the show since S1. Shouldn't Gimple have been moving him toward that point all along? It's like they didn't even try. Just more evidence that Gimple never planned for Carl to survive into adulthood.  

Everyone take a deep breath and process. It totally sucks that Carl is dying. I didn't want that at all. (I'm very upset!) But do you see why I think they're right? How it makes sense for every step along the way and shows that Beth was never going to return until Rick lost Carl?

Links Back to S4, S5, and Beth

This is where things get crazy-epic. So another thing we discussed in our FB group when we all started freaking about these spoilers was whether Rick would die. Not that we think they'd kill off both Carl and Rick in the same season, but it's a valid concern. If Carl dies, and he's what Rick has been living for and protecting for 8 seasons, it's not outside the realm of possibility that Rick will simply fizzle out and die physically as well. I'm here to tell you that's NOT how things will play out. Why? Because of Hershel.

We actually have a few evidences we can point to. First is the Old Man Coda. Just the fact that Rick is dreaming or thinking about the future tells me he'll be in it.

Also, I've always said that, despite what Kirkman says about killing off Rick, Gimple would never do that. Lots of story tellers get away with doing that sort of thing, and some with great success, but the fact remains it's not a particularly great story telling technique. You should always end with the character you start with. Gimple is too good a story teller to pull a stunt like that. The show started with Rick. It will end with him too. I'll come back to this, as it's probably the biggest evidence of everything I'm saying here and the reason for the title of this post.  

First, let's talk about why I'm sure Rick will survive Carl's death.  

Ties to Grady:

First, back to Grady. Remember THIS POST I did after season 6, about how weird and annoying it was that they focused so much on Dawn's backstory. We just didn't care and wanted to know other things, but they kept telling us about Captain Hanson who was the leader at Grady before Dawn. They went out of their way to tell us that the two of them weren't rivals. He was her mentor, in fact. She loved him (platonically) and they were very close. Now, we all know that if Beth is really dead, the Grady story line was one ginormous waste. No one living (apparently) took anything from that arc, so it was entirely superfluous. Of course we believe Beth IS alive, so Grady wasn't a waste. It was all about her.

In considering that, I theorized that Dawn's back story MUST be a foreshadow of Beth's arc. There's no other reason for them to include it. So I thought that captain Hanson would = Rick. Rick would crack at some point, and Beth would step in for him as leader. Guys, we're about to see that happen.

I'll admit I thought we were seeing it in S7. Rick definitely cracked under the pressure of Negan and Glenn's death. By the end of 7x01, he was sniveling, snot-covered mess. But he came back from that and was very strong in standing up to Negan in 7x16 and now so far in S8, he's been the badass Rick Grimes that we all know and love.  

So, if Rick came back from Glenn's death, came back from all the traumatic times he thought he'd lose Carl, etc., what would actually crack him to the point of shattering? The only thing would be losing Michonne or one of his children. Rick and Michonne talked about the possibility of losing one another last season and how they have to go on. Yeah, that kind of points to it being Michonne, but based on what the spoilers said and all this stuff above, I think it'll be Carl. I think the real foreshadow in their convo in 7x12 was that, even after epic loss, no matter what that is, they have to be able to go on and lead their people. Rick is not going to be able to do that for at time.

Now, I know that Hanson being killed by Dawn may make it seem like Rick will die. In the Hanson story, Rick = Hanson and Beth = Dawn. But 1) I've always said that Beth won't kill Rick. She's a better person than Dawn was and will have a great deal of MERCY for Rick. In a twisted way, Dawn did mentor Beth, but Beth learned what NOT to do from her. ("I get it now.") And 2) There's season 4a and Hershel.

Ties to Season 4a:

Let's return to 4a. And hold onto your butts because this level of planning on Gimple's part may just blow your mind.  

Remember the "we get to come back" theme? Most people only remember it from Rick's epic speech to the Governor in 4x08, but it actually started way before that.

In 4x01, after Rick's encounter with Crazy Walker Chick/Clara, he went back to the prison and told Hershel all about it. You can tell Rick is depressed that he was unable to save Crazy Walker Chick, unable to keep her from taking her own life. Hershel talks him through it. 

Check out how interesting this convo is:

Hershel: Some people are too far gone. You're not. You tried to help her.

Rick: How that woman wound up. I got close to that. If I lost Carl and Judith. If I lost this place--

Hershel: Not then, Rick. Not even then. You came back. Your boy came back. You get to come back. You do...

Whoa. Massive foreshadowing there. It's all about Carl and Judith. Rick thinks if he lost Carl, he couldn't come back, which is while he'll end up like Crazy Walker Chick for a time. But Hershel tells him that even then, he can come back. *So crazy to see stuff like this from 4x01 that STILL hasn't been fulfilled!*

In this scene, it's obvious that Rick doesn't entirely believe what Hershel says. He doesn't contradict him, but he's skeptical. It's not until he's facing the governor in 4x08 that he really learns and believes that people get to come back. He has to believe it at that point because he's begging the Governor not to bulldoze their home. That's why Hershel gives that heartbreaking smile just before he dies. It's the smile a mentor whose pupil just learned the lesson. 🙁

So how does all this tie together?

Think of it this way. 4a was one huge foreshadow, not only of Carl's death, but of Rick's reaction to it. At the beginning of S4, Rick is NOT the leader at the prison. And why is that? Because of Carl. It's like he tells Daryl when they're digging graves. Daryl is asking Rick if he'll come back and be a leader in the middle of the virus crisis again. 

Rick refuses because he's afraid of losing Carl. "I almost lost my boy..."  

But through the course of 4a, Rick slowly realizes he was wrong to not be the leader. By the time 4x08 happens and the prison falls, he's already decided to be the leader again. And after 4x08, he's back to being the sheriff.  So he gets to come back, even after he loses Carl.

Now let's talk Hershel. There are a few ways in which Hershel is paralleled with Beth in 4a. There's this picture on the wall that suggests Oceanside, the Java Saves cup, which is a Jesus reference. And even he and Michonne represent the prisoner exchange at Grady. But I've never been able to come up with a truly satisfactory reason why they use Hershel for some of these parallels.

Granted, he's a Greene. And her father. She's a lot like him. So maybe it’s not rocket science. But even so. Especially with things like the ship painting, why show that with Hershel? HE won't be alive when Oceanside comes into play. Why not show it with Maggie? Or Daryl? I think I finally understand why.  

Think of it this way: when Rick wasn't leading at the prison, who was? Daryl for one thing. 

They made a big deal about how Daryl was getting all kinds of love for helping people, and the prison's residents really looked up to him. As with all things Daryl, he was handling mostly the physical stuff. Hunting, feeding people, keeping the fences up, and bringing new people in (foreshadow of him scouting with Aaron for Alexandria, btw). But he wasn't the de facto leader. He wasn't the one everyone looked to for moral guidance and decision making. Who was?

Hershel. Even Daryl looked to him to make decisions and then Daryl got it done. 

So now we're going to see this again. It's a repeating arc. (I always say things foreshadow or parallel one another, but it's not like 4a wasn't its own arc. It totally was. If you don't believe me that this show repeats arcs, go check out @angelthefirst1's amazing metas about it. She'll convince you. ;D)

Rick will actually lose Carl this time, and have to step down from leadership because he can't handle it. Daryl definitely will lead. If you STILL haven't read @thegloriouscollectorlady's 4 Arcs for 4 Communities theory (even though I've told you to like a 100x ;D) do so now. She predicated months ago (has it been a year?) that Daryl and Beth would lead together.  

So you can see that Beth will actually step into Hershel's role at the prison. Daryl will lead with her and take care of the physical side of things, but Beth will be the de facto leader everyone looks to for guidance and decision making.  

More than that, I think just as Hershel taught Rick that he could come back, Beth will be instrumental in guiding Rick back and helping him come back from Carl's death.  

What was taught and foreshadowed by Hershel will be fulfilled in Hershel's daughter. The new sheriff in town. That's why Rick won't die.  

What I'm saying is that Gimple planned it this way from the get go. From 4x01 when Gimple took the reins of the show, he structured it as this massive redemption arc for Rick. We're now heading into the darkest part of that arc, when he actually loses Carl.  

But Beth is a huge part of that. She was never going to return until Rick needed her so desperately. This is why she's the coda. Why she's the song bird and the hope that will keep the group going when Rick simply can't. We really couldn't have understood all of this back in season 5. Or 6. Or 7.

I want to add in some thoughts that @thegloriouscollectorlady shared with me because they're just so damn beautiful.

Back to the iconic hat/new sheriff in town scene.  

TD has always argued that one of the reasons this MUST means something is that it seemed entirely unnecessary for Beth to be in the scene. On the surface, having this flashback seemed to be an explanation about how/why Rick became a farmer and about, you know, Carl. So we always argued that there had to be a reason for them to bring her into the scene. I know I've said many times that it might have made more sense for Michonne to be in the scene because she's closer to Rick and Carl. And again, the reason they didn't was because they needed to put the hat on Beth for symbolic purposes.  

But it's so much more than that now. Obviously her being there wasn't unnecessary, even putting that hat aside. She's tied up with this arc of Carl's death and Rick stepping down as leader.

And as @thegloriouscollectorlady observed, this scene becomes epic, even when it comes to just Rick and Hershel. They didn't put any other characters (I.e. Daryl, Michonne) into that scene because they didn't want them there. This scene is about the relationship between two men and their children.  

Remember that this happened before Rick and Daryl became brothers/Rickyl. And of course they were good friends back then and leaned heavily on one another, but their brotherly relationship didn't solidify until after this happened.

I would argue that at this point in time (the flashback) Rick might have actually been closer to Hershel than to Daryl. The relationship was different, as Hershel was his mentor, but he went to Hershel as a confidant in 4x01, not Daryl. (Just gonna throw out there that at that exact same time, Daryl went to Beth about Zack. Are we seeing the emotional intimacies in these relationships?)

So in this scene we have a representation that Hershel's child (Beth) will save Rick's child (Judith) at the moment he loses his son (Carl). The younger generation rises up as the older one falters. The new sheriff comes to town.

Do you see the plan? Gimple has been heading toward this since Daryl, Sasha and Ty hit the Big Spot and Michonne rode in on a horse.  

I also think this is why we’ve seen so many things pointing to S8. Yes, it has everything to do with Beth’s return, but I also think it’s because S8 is where we’ll start to see the fulfillment of the foreshadowing set up in S4.

Let me also say that, although I still think Carl’s S8 arc may lead to Beth, all of this has made me realize that it may just be symbolic too. Carl will “bring” Beth into her sheriff/leadership role. But it may still be literal as well.

Back to Kirkman. Kirkman has always said that he would eventually kill off Rick and Carl would take over. Though I've never been a fan of that idea, for some reason this has given me more respect for it. (No, that's not particularly logical, but it's the truth.)  

Kirkman always planned for Carl to inherit Rick's legacy of leadership. And it's his comic book series, so more power to him.  

But that was never true of Gimple. It's plain to me now that he never planned to follow Kirkman's lead in this regard. For him, it was always about Beth. We know he alone handled her arc in S2, purposely making her weak so we could see her become strong. Her character and her development were always his doing. His baby.  

He always planned that Beth would inherit Rick's leadership legacy. In short, Beth Greene was ALWAYS Gimple's sheriff.  

Mr. Gimple, you are a freaking rock star. I have more respect for you as a story teller than any other I've ever come across. And trust me, I've come across quite a lot.  

Bethyl on, my friends. Bethyl on! And do take some time to mourn the fact that in only two seasons, the Atlanta Five will become the Atlanta Three.

Update and Disclaimer: 

I wrote this post about three days ago, after the spoilers first broke, and I do stand behind most of what I wrote above.

Yesterday, this was found and posted in my FB group. Please note that some comments are either deleted or not visible, which is why it’s a little confusing.

So it suggests these spoilers are untrue.

Let me first say that I HOPE they are, because I don’t want to lose Carl. And you know, if I am, then this post is mostly wrong. ;D 

But I still lean toward them being true. Let me explain why. We’re really looking at one of three possible scenarios here.

1. The spoiler site is full of crap. We’ve seen them be wrong before, especially over Beth stuff. However, I tend to think that’s not the case here. I could be wrong, of course, but for one thing, they said in teh original spoilers that it was unconfirmed, and we should take it with a grain of salt. It’s usually when they’re being super arrogant about things that they’re wrong. So I kind of think this is true, or at least they really believe it is. 

Also, they make a good point in the spoilers that they pieced both Bob and Beth’s deaths and departure from the show this way and were right both times. For things this big, they actually do have a good track record. It’s more the details that they get wrong.

2. Second possibility, the dude saying it’s fake is full of crap. We’ve seen AMC do things before to contain spoilers, and this could be that kind of attempt. This is definitely huge and something they would have wanted to keep under wraps. It wouldn’t surprise me in the least if this is a tactic.

3. Both are right. Kind of. It could be that the dude is right about Chandler being on set and on the call sheets, but Carl is still dying. While I can’t back it up as fact (I don’t have a link or reference) I know I’ve read before that both Sarah Wayne Callies and Irone Singleton (Lori and T-Dog) were kept coming back to set periodically and were still on the callsheets after their deaths. That was to hide the fact that they’ve left the show. They’ve done this less in recent seasons as the actors want to move on to other projects quickly, but Chandler is young and going to school and it wouldnt’ be hard to have him stick around for appearances.

That said, my FB peeps who follow the Tumblrs of locals who troll the spoiler site have told me the locals have reported that they really haven’t seen Chandler in months. Something to consider. If he was there, chances are quite good they’d have seen him. But not absolute, of course.

So overall, this means that either could be right. Or both. Carl could be alive. Or dead. I’m kind of 50/50 on it right now.

I decided to go ahead and post this because, overall, I stand behind the symbolism. Obviously if Carl doesn’t die, the stuff about Carl’s death isn’t true. And not to sound insensitive, but it might be just a detail. Maybe Carl’s not dying, but SOMEone is (Michonne? Judith?) Rick’s red-rimmed eyes (damn those things are red!) and the cross he sits under do suggest a funeral and devastation on his part. Maybe Carl isn’t dying but something will happen that’s so debilitating, and Rick blames himself for it forwhatever reason, that he still loses his confidence and steps down as leader. 

I don’t know. But overall, no matter what the details are, I still think this template is a thing and that it will pave the way for Beth’s arc, which TD has been waiting for since season 4. 

If you got all the way through this, YOU, are a freaking rock star! 

[another-chorus-girl]

“Erik House” Chapter 8

It was Crawford's turn on the parlour's pipe organ. Since there had been previous disputes over the instrument constant use, they’d had to make up a scheduled allowance of sorts for its use. 

His hands caressed the keys as music filled the room. 

Kerik took a seat by Lewis and Warlow, watching the older Merik play.

"Nighttime sharpens, heightens each sensation. "Darkness wakes and stirs imagination, "Silently the senses, abandon their defenses. "Helpless to resist the notes I write, "For I compose the music of the night"

As Crawford sang aloud, Kerik raised a brow from beneath his mask. "I've heard you lot sing this a hundred times, why does his sound different?" Kerik asked

"This was an earlier version he wrote, no one else knows it." Warlow stated.

"Close your eyes, for your eyes will only tell the truth. "And the truth isn't what you want to see"

Crawford continued to sing.

"In the dark it is easy to-"

"AAH OHH!"

Crawford's hands faltered on the keys as the organ groaned in protest. Kerik and the other Merik's looked around for the source of the strange noise.

Crawford continued playing, seeming to ignore whatever had just happened.

"Close your eyes start a journey to a strange new world, "Leave all thoughts of the world you knew before. "Close your eyes and let music set you fr-" But Crawford was interrupted yet again.

"Bathing beauty, "Take a look at....YOU!"

They heard the strange sound coming from above them.

"Sweet musics throne! What is THAT?!" Kerik asked.

The other two Meriks glanced uneasily at Crawford, whom they could see was clenching his fists.

"Bathing beauty, on the beach "Bathing beauty, say 'Hello!' "Whatta cutie! "Whatta peach! "Bathing beauty, watch her go!"

They heard it coming from the third floor. 

Crawford stood, storming down toward the stairwell. 

"Uh oh," Lewis vocalised turning to Warlow. "Go find Jones, NOW"

Kerik scratched his head, "I don't get it. I thought the only one he had a problem with was that talentless tenor Gerik."

Lewis shook his head, "Think about this: if you were the debuter of a show and years later another story comes and throws all of that character development you worked so hard on out the window for vaudeville trash how would you feel?"

Not waiting for a reply the Merik followed Warlow as he made a beeline for Jones room. Dragging Karimloo and Mauer along as well, they found Jones and hustled up to the third floor. 

"Dots? Dots? DOTS? DOTS?! DOTS!"

Mr. Y had been sent a copy of the latest dress rehearsal for Phantasma's opening act back in America by Giry.

He mused Dots made much more sense than Checks.

Suddenly he heard a pounding on the door. Confused he stood opening the door to see Crawford fuming, the older Merik looked as though he were going to have an aneurysm.

"What seems to be the problem, monsieur?" Mr. Y asked cautiously. Gerik had already told him about the ambush this man and the others had established.

"The problem is whatever that insufferable caterwauling is!" Crawford scowled,

Mr. Y sighed, "Now I know what you're going to say-"

"Oh do you now? I've composed symphonies, let music consume me day and night, did the impossible and completed my masterpiece. And you have the gall to insinuate that years later THIS is what comes from the same composer that wrote 'Don Juan Triumphant?!'" Crawford ranted. Despite the height difference the Merik seemed to tower over the much taller man with his outrage. "

Fortunately the others were able to pull Crawford back before he could reach for the lasso and risk doing something rash. 

Karimloo held Crawford back pinning his arms back.

"Unhand me this instant!" The older Merik demanded, it was rare to see him fuming so. Almost frightening even.

Jones attempted to calm his friend down, helping lead the Meriks out of the room. "Now now, there's no need for anymore violence-we’ve done enough of that in the past. Just calm yourself Crawford, remember your blood pressure-"

"TO HELL WITH MY BLOOD PRESSURE!" 

Mr. Y then made a mental note to sound proof the room that day forward. --

The carriage pulled up to the house's main gate, a lone figure stepped out thanking the driver. 

The man had been advised this was the right address to find the masked man. Having been told the door would be left unlocked, he turned the doorknob. 

"Erik?" He called. "Erik, you're a poor host playing this game of hide and-AHHHHH!"

From upstairs the shriek could be heard even up on the third floor.

"Allah above! What nightmare have I been thrown into?!" The Persian man gaped, entering a parlour room finding not one but five masked men. While they're masks and appearances differed from Erik, they held a similar air of sophistication and dominance.

Carpenter and Gaines stared quizzically at the man.

"Who...is he exactly?" Gaines asked. “I feel like I should know him?”

Capenter shook his head, "I'm not sure. But I feel like we're missing something very important?"

Lerik stared blankly at Daroga, whom was babbling rather fast in Persian. This man seemed familiar.

"I know that language anywhere!" Trotting down the stairs Kerik made a beeline for the parlour. "Really! All this time I thought you were never going to-"

But the novelised man paused when he saw the dark skinned man.

"Wait, you're not Nadir. You sound like him, but somethings not the same." His yellow eyes looked the man up and down. Daroga shuddered inwardly as Kerik smirked. “Hmm”

"I say stop hounding him, all of you!" The others whipped their heads toward the sound of Erik's voice as he slowly trudged up the basement stairs.

"E-Erik?" Daroga said, marching over to the masked man. "It...It is you right?"

Erik swatted Daroga's hand away as he rolled his golden eyes.

"Of course it's me you great booby!" The full masked man said as if it were obvious. "Now come along! I need you to take a look at something."

Following him down the stairs, the Persian man hesitantly glanced back at the others whom stared right back as he went down to the basement floor.

"I still want to know who he is!" Gaines blurted out. -- Kerik felt Ayesha rub up against his leg mewing up at him as he played.

  "It's my turn," Warlow noted to the novelized man.

"I'm almost finished, don't get your bowtie in a twist," Kerik teased

"You said you were almost finished ten minutes ago!"

Reading the Epoque with one leg crossed over the other, Panaro sat with Soot peacefully curled up in front of him. 

As Ayesha continued mewing, the labradoodle's head perked up. The dog stood and trotted over to Ayesha in curiosity. he Siamese stared up at the new, giant, fluffy presence. Soot was massive in comparison, but Ayesha did not scare easy and the labradoodle was no threat.

"Hey," Kerik picked Ayesha up, noticing the dog as well. "Leave my little lady alone."

Panaro turned his head, "Oi, my dog wouldn't hurt a hair on your cat. Let him be."

Soot sat watching the cat with wide, dark eyes. He scooted closer, sniffing her face.

Ayesha didn't seem to like her personal space invaded and reached out. Neither Kerik or Panaro could suppress a chuckle watching a five pound Siamese boop a large labradoodle playfully on the nose.

--

Several miles away, the Daroga heaved a sigh leaning over the table.

"So there were six of him?" Nadir asked,

He nodded as the other Persian man shuddered.

"Lord, one is difficult enough." Nadir shook his head, reflecting back on Kerik's outragous antics.

Ledoux silently nodded, agreeing with the other two men, Lerik could be quite the handful despite the man not uttering a word.

"Another round gentlemen?" The bartender asked. Everytime the three Persian men got together here, it seemed to be under stressful circumstances. He wondered often what troubled these men so. Perhaps it was family related.

"It's on me tonight," Nadir declared, "I feel somewhat responsible for not warning you prior to your visit."

Ledoux made a series of hand gestures and leaned back in his chair with his hands clasped together.

"He apologises as well," Nadir explained.

The three men raised a glass.

"To a maskless Erik free evening," Daroga toasted.

"Here here," Nadir agreed, Ledoux remaining silent but clinking his glass with a curt nod.

On the other side of the pub, the Persian men failed to notice Destler glancing in their direction quizzically.

"Another monsieur?" The lady asked, breaking Destler's concentration as she took his empty glass.

Shrugging his shoulders and turning back to his latest composition Destler nodded.

"Please," He answered, continuing his work.

-The version of “Music of the Night” Crawford sings is from the promo video for the musical back in 1986. As far as I’m aware there arn’t many Phantoms that have sung this version, or at least I haven’t heard any.

-Crawford’s hatred of LND is slight Actor Allusion as it stems from an interview Michael did a few years ago. While he didn’t directly say he hated the sequel when asked he didn’t seem to like the idea of Phantom continuing when the ending was just fine the way it was.

-The Dots and Checks remark is due to the OLC recording of LND has Meg wearing a checkered bathing suit at the finale of “Bathing Beauty” whereas the Australian version (and the version my Mr. Y comes from) used dots. 

-Michael Crawford stands at 5′10 wheras Ben Lewis stands at a whopping 6′2 (many of the popular Phantoms are fairly tall, Crawford is an exception and Wilkinson at 5′8)

-Yes Daroga (Leroux), Nadir (Kay), and Inspector Ledoux (1925 film) are three seperate men as the Eriks and Christines are separate. 

[septicquest]

CALLING ALL ARTISTS!

Attention: This is not a Septic Quest page. Rather this is just an announcement that relates to why I have not been posting here for such a long time. idk what will happen to SQ after this and idk how far this thing is going to go. I won’t blame you if you hate me for being hesitant on the matter or if you unfollow me for such an action. But if you do want to participate in this new project of mine, I will love and appreciate the shit out of you even after I die, I swear. Please don’t hate me. Thanks.

So I’m sure ya’ll are aware of this web series thing I’m doing called “Allister & Melody” right? With all the voice acting and the original story and music and stuff? Well if you didn’t know and you’ve been wondering why I haven’t gotten to doing things like Septic Quest and Jacksepticeye, there’s your answer. It’s cuz I’ve been working on an original story with...pretty much everything I just mentioned.

If ya’ll need a little hint about what it’s gonna look like, - here’s a link to the promo. -

However, I have hit a slight dent in the road. Here’s the story.

So who here was here from the very beginning of Septic Quest? You know, like BEFORE Jack started reblogging some pages?...I see a few hands out there. Well anyway, I made a HUGE mistake when I started making this comic. What was it you ask?

I was working on it ALONE!

Which is probably the biggest mistake I’ve ever made in my life.....okay, maybe not the biggest, but it was a kick in the ass nonetheless. You see, this comic was supposed to be a really really REALLY long story. Like, it had three volumes worth of story. Don’t get me wrong, I love every moment of this story and I wish I could get it out to the world somehow someday, but right now just isn’t the time. However, it is still kinda cannon to the story I’m currently writing. (and don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying you can’t accomplish anything big on your own, it’s just really really hard on your physical and mental health if you bite off more than you can chew. Especially if you’re someone like me.)

Why am I telling ya’ll all of this? Well....honestly I’m not really sure myself. idk if I’ll continue the story as a comic or if I’m going to hand if off to someone else anytime soon. My mind is actually focused on Allister & Melody at the moment. So if ya’ll really followed Septic Quest specifically for the Jacksepticeye story, this is pretty much goodbye for another long while. And ya’ll can stop reading at this point and go off on your day. Thanks for listening. ^^

...Still here? Oh cool, hopefully that means you care. Thanks! Although I’ll warn you a second time, from this point on it’s all an announcement about Al & Mel and how I need help on it.

                  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

STILL HERE!? Man, you’re persistent...I like that in you. ^^

Alright fine, no more nonsense. I NEED HELP! I’m on a hunt for awesome artists and/or animators for my thing. I’m hosting an audition for artists to join my rank to make this story come alive! ....uh..speaking of story, maybe I should explain that first before I go any further, shouldn’t I? ^^’

Ya’ll remember Allister, right? He was that tall guy dressed in black in the SQ comic? Leader of Tutopia? Right, that guy. Well that’s him right in the middle of the pic there, and this is him AFTER Septic Quest.

The story is he’s stuck on Earth for unknown reasons (to the audience that is) and is forced to live on Earth with humans and limited powers. Along the way, he meets a young little girl named Melody (the little cutie blond dressed in green) who is strangely an angel almost just like him! Except this little girl is being hunted down by an organization called the Child Protection Agency (CPA) where they take care of lost kids in the streets. Lately, they’ve had their eyes on her because of the powers she has. Allister, being the only one who has actual knowledge of her powers, sees it upon himself to take care of Melody and keep her from any humans who may want to take advantage of her. Along the way, he meets some strange new friends as well as old enemies, and shenanigans ensue thus creating an opportunity for a little show to create!

So there ya go, that’s the synopsis of what’s going on. Now for info on the show itself. Like you saw in the promo (if you clicked it, if not, here it is again), it’s going to have original everything: original voice acting, original score, original animation. But it’s not FULLY animated since that would take WAAAAY too long for just one animator. This is where I need help. I made the mistake of not asking for help when I first created Septic Quest, and so I don’t intend on making that same mistake here. If any of ya’ll are interested in being part of this project along side me as an animator/artist (and/or if you’ve got nothing better to do), this is an opportunity for you!

However, this IS an audition. You are going to have to live up to my standards of art in order to be on this team. You won’t necessarily need to learn how to animate. You’ll mostly need to know how to draw some....complicated poses. All of the art is gonna be done like you see in the promo. I figured that was just the easiest way of doing this. Also, this is all voluntary work, so unfortunately you won’t get paid....I probably just lost a bunch of you just saying that.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So here’s what you’ll need!

1. Pen Pad/tablet (or whatever you wanna call it) 2. Any GOOD art program you own, like Photoshop, Flash, SAI, ect. Stuff like MSPaint or sketchbook drawings won’t due. If you draw on a mobile device, I’ll have to look at it and approve it cuz that’s always up in the air. 3. A way of exporting files/images to me. A lot of this pics I’m going to want in PNG format, but JPEGs are also fine in some cases. 4. A Skype or Discord to keep in contact with me just to make things easier. If you’re one of those younger kids who have parents who don’t trust you on the internet (you know who you are) then PM me via however you can, weather it’s through this blog or my main blog, my twitter, my DA, my email (if you can find that one), or anywhere else I guess. But preferably, I would like to have you on Skype or Discord.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you have these things and you’re STILL interested in helping out, well then here’s how you’ll audition.

The way you’re going to be animating this is I will either give you a shot or a character or even a whole scene to animate depending on where your skills lie. You are first going to give me 3-5 pics of your best art as well as a pic or two of whatever character you want to animate (choose however many you want from the pic above). If you can draw that character well, then I’ll add you to the team. If not, don’t feel bad. I’ve got a special place for ones who try ;)

After that, there’s gonna be more info about how I’m going to separate ya’ll into drawing what. There’s gonna be deadlines for these things, so be prepared for that world of pain. In fact, the deadline for your auditions will be sometime after I get back from Bronycon (August 11-13) where I’ll be part of a panel featuring a sneak peak of the first episode all drawn by me. You can submit your auditions through tumblr submissions cuz idk how to work other internet things that involve submitting things. Submit them with your contact name and who you want to draw. It can be as many characters as you want.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Okay, just a brief review of auditions cuz I know I’m gonna get questions later:

1. 3-5 pics of your best art. 2. One or two pics of whatever Al & Mel character you wanna animate (can be as many characters as you like. *refer to the pic up top*). 3. No MSPaint or sketchbook picture taken images. Only good digital art. 4. Have a Skype or Discord for contact purposes. 5. Submit to my tumblr @luximus with your pics along with your contact name. 6. Deadline is August 19. I’ll give several heads ups along the way.

If you have any more questions, ask me on my main blog. DO NOT ask in the Septic Quest blogs cuz these are unrelated to SQ. If you do, I won’t be able to answer them for you, so you have been warned. (watch as it happens anyway -_-) 

~~~~~~~~~~~~

aaaaand I think that’s about it. Don’t be afraid to submit your stuff early. The earlier, the better! Thanks for listening, happy drawing! ^^

[arse-blathanna]

What are your predictions on the plot of RWBY Volume 5 and the characters status on what they'll be doing? Do you think they'll unite in Mistral this volume?

oooh, very good question. I’m just going to start with this little preface just because I think it’s probably going to ultimately ring true: For series like RWBY where it’s often producing episodes as they come out, your trailer will probably be heavily weighted towards the first part of the season. Got that out of the way. 

So here goes nothing, I guess. I’ll try to blow through this in the most logical way possible, but no promises on anything. So.... ignore my shit attempts at organization. 

Also, this is long and under a cut for a reason. Also volume 4 and volume 5 trailer spoilers

For starters, yeah, I do think that we’ll be seeing them reuniting in Mistral because all paths lead there. At the end of Volume 4, 3/4 members of RWBY were actively either in Mistral or on their way there, with the outlier being Blake. Yang is likely to be making a beeline for her sister, while Weiss is doing the same but looking for Winter instead (which I’ll get into in a hot minute.) Blake is doing things with the White Fang but if the trailer is any indicator she will be told that the best way to deal with things is to get out of Menagerie. So... organizing this shit. Let’s go.

Ruby, JN_R, Qrow, and Ozcar

Are already in Mistral. I expect that these plots will separate a little bit as we go. We’ve got Qrow hunting the Spring maiden, which probably brings us to Raven (assuming no red herring.) Ozpin and Oscar have to continue to get used to sharing a headspace, and Oscar’s going to need to learn a thing or two if he’s going to be saving any worlds, in any form. Like how to fight. Or about the Ozluminati (convenient we’ll have two, technically 3 in one place again). Combat school locations make that easier. 

JN_R are going to somehow end up working with Oscar, whether its as temp roommates or future teammates. If teammates, I’m predicting Team ORNJ. With Salty Jaune. Ever think about how Oscar doesn’t know about Pyrrha? Ever think about how Jaune will probably flip shit if he finds out about Ozpin’s voice living in Oscar’s head? No? Well, you are now. 

As for Ruby, she’s going to be along for the ride for a little bit until she finds herself with her team again. The question of whether someone is still going after her fancy eyes is something to consider (I’m guessing Watts, but there are reasons for that.) If Ruby reunites with her teammates, they’ll be able to really start doing their thing again. 

Weiss, Winter, and Politics

Weiss will be on of our big windows into the politics of the whole situation that they’ve found themselves in, mostly through her connection to Ironwood. As of Volume 4, Winter was investigating certain irregularities in Mistral and reporting back to Ironwood. Weiss heads off on her own to find her sister, which will likely drop her in the city of Mistral itself if there will be any direct contact with Leo for Winter’s work. There, she’s likely to find Ruby, and they’ll reunite and things will be peachy keen. 

In the trailer and some promo stuff we see signs that Weiss has gotten into fights with something. There was an image going around that looked like she was firing out of the back of the airship she was taking, so that’s something to expect. We see a full summoned knight in action, so she’s definitely improving her summoning.

Winter and Weiss reuniting puts them at least close to Mistral, so it’s not hard to imagine them running into each other. Especially if Winter and Qrow fight again for whatever reason (and honestly, they probably will: I’d guess that the Great Atlesian Isolation will be a catalyst of sorts), we’ll definitely see Weiss joining up with Ruby. If Winter sees Qrow’s there, she might end up calling on Ironwood. 

Hard to say, but this is one of the plots I’m more interested in. Especially since Weiss was just outside the door when Ironwood made the big decision to cut off Atlas. She’s the only one that was really there, and that has the potential to be a whole thing. 

Blake, Sun, Ilia, and the White Fang’s Tiger Mom: 

When we last saw Blake was the Character short about her, and we saw her dicking around Menagerie beating up street kids with Sun. They haven’t left Menagerie yet and as of right now, I don’t think it’s even on their minds. It seems like Ilia’s going to pass on the information to make them go to find Sienna Khan. If (though I prefer when in this case), that happens, expect for Ghira and Kali to stay behind. 

If Ilia leaves Menagerie, don’t necessarily expect it to be for good reasons. She’s a spy, and while she and Blake have some sort of truce, that probably won’t be enough to stop her from doing her job entirely. It’s hard to say, but I doubt this is the last we’ll see of her if we don’t see her once Blake and Sun leave. 

And if they leave Menagerie, they’re going after Sienna Khan.

Here’s what we know about Sienna Khan: She is the leader of the White Fang, and has apparently been running the operation out of Mistral. Adam mentioned having to go back to Mistral for something in Volume 3′s flashback episode. If Blake is going to fight Sienna or the Fang, this is a logical place to go. Adam’s also known to be there, and that’s another piece of the puzzle. As of the end of Volume 4, Hazel Rainart was supposed to have a meeting with Sienna but we don’t know if it’s happened yet or will be handled onscreen. It’s kind of a thing. 

Blake and Sun’s path for the White Fang brings them to Mistral, and I don’t know the specifics, but it would put them close to the others so there’s a strong possibility for a run in. Amplify that when you remember that Sun is a student of Haven, where RNJR is currently hanging out. SSSN might get a reunion while RWBY also gets to work on theirs. 

Yang, Motorcycles, and Raven

My first prediction is that we’re going to kiss Yang’s bike goodbye because it has the potential to be a massive pain in the ass if they ever get back into road trip mode. That’s not a big one, but I don’t expect much from it. 

Word of God statements say that everyone isn’t quite recovered yet, and I think they’re very much referring to Yang in that point. She’s got a new metal arm, but we’ve never seen her in a real fight with it, and definitely not one where it’s not friendly turf. That’s probably going to come up eventually, but I’m not really sure I want to speculate on it too much. 

The big thing here is that when she left home, we knew that she was heading for Mistral. Whether she was going for Ruby or for Raven was left ambiguous, but ultimately it won’t actually matter. If she goes to Ruby, she meets up with her sister again. If she goes to Raven, she meets up with Ruby anyways because Ruby is with Qrow who is after Raven. Got it? Good. 

This is going to be the season where the Raven Subplot really gets underway. Expect the explosions from that mess finally coming into contact with one another. 

Some Other Cool Dudes (aka: Team WTCH):

As of the end of Volume 4, we have some new nuggets about WTCH and I want to just tear through them one by one since they matter a little bit just a smidge sorta kinda. 

Arthur Watts is now confirmably the Blackmailer in Chief to Leo Lionheart. He’s a bastard who will put his feet up on all of the tables if he gets the chance. If this holds true,  then I won’t be surprised to see him infiltrating Ozluminati further through Leo, but because he’s an adult and not a student, he may be able to get much farther than Cinder would have. I expect to see more of him, to say the least. Also, he may end up being the one hunting Ruby this season specifically since the two of them are already in the same place. 

Tyrian Callows left off at the end of Volume 4 as a very happy man that definitely hasn’t been recently injured or anything. The question with regards to him is whether Salem sends him back into the field (likely, by my guess,) and whether he will be sent after Ruby is up in the air. The bigger question, to me, is whether or not he goes after the Spring Maiden. Because if he does.... Raven vs Tyrian, anyone? And if he’s successful? A golden stinger for a golden boy? Who knows, the sky’s the limit.  

Cinder Fall is in the hospital from hell, still doing recovery stuff with Salem. Emerald and Mercury are still hanging around for the time being. When we last saw Cinder, she was trying to get stronger and was literally fueling the hate fires that are going to (eventually) bring her back after Ruby. She may spend another season at a desk, or she might get a new chance. Hard to say right now since she’s the only one Salem can talk to at the moment. 

Hazel Rainart was last seen in Mistral destroying ticket machines for small children. We don’t know if his beginning of volume 4 assignment to meet with Sienna Khan of the White Fang has been fulfilled. If it has, this guy has a lot of question marks attached to him. If it hasn’t (which I consider likely,) then we’re likely to see that meeting in person somehow. Especially now that Sienna has a model. Whatever comes out of that will bleed into the WF plots. 

Other Other Cool Dudes, or just the randos I feel like mentioning:

Team SSSN are students at Haven and Sun coming back with Blake would also reunite that team, for what it’s worth. 

Glynda will continue not to matter that much. If we see her, she either dies or gets recast. 

Klein, Jacques and Whitley are probably going to remain in Atlas. If we see them, it’ll be through Ironwood. The mother will continue to be offscreen. 

Taiyang’s dog still loves him. We won’t see it, but he’s getting together with Oobleck and Port to drink still since he’s a lonely boy again. If we see him, it’ll be Raven-related. Maybe a STRQ reunion? Of sorts?

We won’t see Neo

CFVY is possible but very very unlikely, by my guess. 

We may see some of the Volume 3 tournament characters back, but only in background. I wouldn’t personally count on it. 

not actually characters, but buckle up for the queerbaiting to go up to 11

[i-may-have-a-point]

13x21 “Don’t Stop Me Now” Review

Grey’s Anatomy’s early ratings look like it tied its series low ratings again.  None of us are surprised.  I am a bit surprised that the show is not listening to its fans who are basically begging for them to stop focusing on Mer/Riggs/Maggie and give us something, anything, for Japril, Jolex, and Omelia.  I have accepted the fact that we won’t see any of these ships move until 13x23 or 13x24.  I just haven’t accepted why.  This is not how to build suspense.  Suspense is a cliff hanger that leads into the next episode.  Suspense is not making us wait 10-15 episodes for the characters we love to breathe the same air.  Are we supposed to believe that this hospital that seems to only have about 10 doctors working in it is now suddenly so huge that none of them are even bumping into each other in the hallway?  And not only are they ignoring their best stories, but they are going out of their way to not let the characters even talk about each other by never putting friends in the same scenes, either.  It’s incredibly disappointing for a show with this level of talent and such a large fan following to produce such mediocre episodes.

Alex – Justin Chambers is so talented and clearly a fan favorite.  When people thought he might go to jail in the mid-season premiere, the ratings skyrocketed.  Of course, this is season 13, so he wasn’t even in that episode.  He was simply used to promote it and then we got the prison centric instead.  I hate to see him used as basically a buffer between all the sister’s drama.  He deserves better than that.  He mainly only has scenes with Mer at this point, and I think I know why.  Because as much as the show made a huge deal about Mer being there for Alex during his legal troubles, for the most part, their friendship is mainly about her and what she needs.  And this didn’t start this season.  This started way back when the show thought it was funny for Mer to kick Jo out of Alex’s bed.  This friendship has always been about what Mer needs in the moment and Alex’s feelings come second.  If she truly cared about him, we would see a conversation where Mer asks Alex about Jo. How is he feeling, does he miss her, has he talked to her, etc.  Losing Jo was a huge thing for Alex.  He wanted to marry her.  But instead we get Alex leaning against the wall in the women’s restroom while Mer rehearses her apology to Maggie (all while still sporting a sweater she pulled out of a dusty box in her attic from the 1980s).  Alex is propping Mer in all these scenes because putting him in scenes with her allows the writers to continue to ignore the Jolex story.  Mer would never ask Alex about Jo because she doesn’t really care.  

Maggie – Maggie has been a main focus of four out of the last five episodes (minus the plane episode). I think that Kelly McCreary is probably very talented.  We saw some great moments from her in 13x18.  However, they are making her character, who was already difficult for many people to like, absolutely unbearable.  I understand the idea that she would be upset that Mer lied to her for so long, but that wasn’t the only reason she was mad.  “Is he a good kisser?”  “Did you join the mile high club?”  She was also mad that Mer is with her crush.  And that is all he was.  A crush. She had more of a relationship with Deluca and she cared for all of five minutes when he broke up with her.  To compare those reactions makes her reaction to this seem particularly childish.  I would prefer to see them focus on how brilliant she is and let her really show her skills in the OR as a teacher.  She doesn’t feel like a badass cardio chief right now.  She feels like Mer’s annoying little sister who wants whatever her big sister has.  The cardiothoracic department at Grey-Sloan has seen Preston Burke, Cristina Yang, Erica Hahn, Teddy Altman…Maggie is not living up to their reputations.  At least by the end of the episode it seems that they might be done with this story.  We can only hope.

April/Stephanie/Deluca – Similar to Cross’s TB story, this group and their wormy patient had some of the best scenes of the episode.  I thought it was interesting that April, Steph, and Deluca were grouped together again, especially since it doesn’t seem like April is mentoring them (clearly that just doesn’t happen anymore).  And then I realized this is the same situation as Alex.  April is with Steph because that makes is easy for the writers to not have April discuss her situation with Jackson.  She definitely isn’t going to tell his rebound about falling into bed with him in Montana, and she isn’t close enough to Deluca to talk to him.  If they actually put April in scenes with Arizona or Riggs, it would be weird if they didn’t talk about Jackson.  So we get none of that.  Deluca tried to talk to Steph about Jo a few episodes ago, but she shut him down, so he probably won’t be spilling his feeling to her again.  This trio is the perfect set up for good comedic moments, and it also allows the writers to continue to ignore Japril and Jo/Deluca.

April/Webber/Bailey/Catherine – I liked this story.  I actually think it is believable that Bailey and April would team up to try to reunite Webbery.  I love that April gave Bailey her confidence back by telling her she is very similar to Catherine, and I thought Bailey’s speech was very “Bailey.”  I miss strong, confident Bailey.  They need to bring her out more often.  And while April was not as successful with convincing Webber to forgive Catherine, it was nice to hear April say that relationships deserve a second chance even if there are flaws.  Because that basically sums up all the love stories ever on Grey’s Anatomy.

The Press Conference – This came off as cheesy to me.  It seems like just another way the show is telling us how amazing Mer is this season. Other characters keep telling her/us that she is hot, and now the press is falling all over themselves to ask questions about her superb surgical skills.  I’m not saying her surgery on the plane wasn’t cool, it was.  She operated on someone’s brain with a straw and a cup. Very cool.  I just can’t help but think that she is a general surgeon, not certified in neurosurgery, who performed brain surgery and the show is acting like she is a hero.  But a few episodes ago when April, a trauma surgeon who IS certified in general surgery, filled in as Interim Chief of General, the characters lined up to call her a traitor.  Mer’s surgery was cool, but so was Japril’s throat transplant, and Alex figuring out the teenager had Ehler’s Danlos syndrome, and Maggie performing heart surgery on a baby still in the womb.  These doctors perform one in a million surgeries almost every episode, and yet Mer gets the press conference.  If she is really so great the show shouldn’t need to keep reminding the audience of that. We would see if on our own.  But the press conference was really about Maggie discovering Riggs and Mer have feeling for each other.  Riggs rubbing her shoulder was supposed to be a moment of obvious chemistry and sparks.  Too bad that moment cannot even compare to the one we got with Owen and Amelia.

Owen and Amelia – It seems like they are building to Amelia actually dealing with her feelings.  She keeps getting thrown into difficult pregnancy surgeries.  I thought her holding Veronica while she died was beautiful and sweet.  But that elevator hug. Was. Everything.  Owen and Amelia didn’t even need to speak.  He saw she was upset and he went to her.  It didn’t matter that they had hurt each other or that she moved out.  Nothing in that moment mattered except the woman he loves needed him, so he was there. To be able to convey so much love and emotion with no words is great chemistry.  That is what Mer and Riggs are lacking and what makes Japril, Jolex, and Omelia the reasons we are still watching.

Jackson and Maggie – I know that Jesse was working out of the country when this episode was filmed, so I didn’t even expect to see him.  It’s unfortunate that the one scene he was in was just him listening to Maggie complain, but I think this is another example of throwing people together who won’t ask about each other’s personal lives.  Maggie is so self-absorbed at the moment, she certainly isn’t going to ask Jackson about April, or even why he suddenly stopped hating Eliza for that matter.  And Jackson is a neutral third party for Maggie to whine to.  It was a waste of thirty seconds really, but I can’t complain about seeing Jackson on my screen, I guess.  

Webber/Catherine – Their end scene was cute.  It is always nice to see Catherine’s softer side.  Let’s hope their drama is behind them as well.  

 A few random thoughts:

I am always impressed with how Sarah Drew can both break my heart and make me laugh out loud.  She is such a bright light on this show.  

Veronica dying was a tearjerker.  I mean, we knew it was coming, but the scene was really well done.  The actress was fantastic, the music was perfect, it was everything we need more of this season.  

I am happy to see Alex featured in next week’s promo.  Seeing Justin play opposite Camilla’s real life boyfriend should be interesting.  If we can’t get Jolex movement, at least Alex might get a decent story.  

Is Debbie Allen’s daughter (the random resident) filling in where Camilla was supposed to be?  Or Leah?

Jackson told Maggie he couldn’t make it to the press conference.  Safae on Twitter joked that he must have been busy…with April.  My Japril heart is going to believe she is right.  

[canaryatlaw]

Ugh, I don't know what's gotten into me this week, but I've officially lost all my ambition to like, get out of bed in the morning, because I woke up today and was like lol nope and went back to bed and like that's BAD but I was also pretty productive and got a lot of shit done so I don't feel that bad about it?? Lol. Anyway. I woke up again around noon and had some breakfast, then got to work putting the final touches on my LARC assignment, which was gonna be what I did when I got home today. While I was doing so I made some of the vanilla bean rice pudding I like a lot because I'd bought a whole gallon of milk (instead of my usual half gallon) with the intention of making it so I figured I should do that, and it came out quite nicely. LARC was mostly putting in citations, which is unfortunately trickier than one might hope. The word limit was 1750, and I had it down to 1710 before I added citations, but it quickly got up to like 1763 or something so I had to go back and cut words to finish it up, but ultimately I was pretty satisfied with it. Like I said yesterday, I'd probably be more nervous about it if it was actually getting graded, but since it's just a hand in it's not that big of a deal, and I don't really have to worry about my prof thinking I'm a slacker or anything since grading is anonymous, so that's helpful. After I finished the actual document I had to do a couple accompanying things that didn't take too long. After that I mostly just did a bunch of little things to take care of that needed to get done, like updating the company tumblr since it was about 5 days past its weekly update deadline, which means I had to decide if I wanted to put the posts I've reblogged about punching nazis on there, and it was a hard call, but I figured as much as I tend to get social justice-y (and probably way too political, even when I'm trying to be good) and this probably falls well outside the area of our actual subject matter, so I let that one go (but of course there will still be plenty of those on here). After a while I decided to watch some tv while still doing stuff, so I put on this week's flash episode being that I haven't gotten a chance to watch it yet, and I was pretty satisfied with it, definitely better than this week's arrow (though that's not really saying much). All the Iris and Barry stuff had me like AHHHHHHHHH SO MANY FEELINGSSSSS but I love their journey as a couple and how they're dealing with things, and as much as I understand why they wouldn't want to tell Joe about the Savitar thing, I feel like that's gonna come back to bite them in the end (because these things normally do, though if they kill him off I still s2g I will injure all of them). I loved the Caitlin/Julian stuff, and CAITLINNNNNN my poor baby you deserve so much happiness and I don't want you to ever be hurting because it's so sad!!!!! I like the Julian being on the team thing a lot though, and I think their friendship (??) could be very good for them. The villain I didn't really find all that interesting, he wasn't really the main focus of the episode anyway so it didn't matter all that much. Seeing Barry's somewhat futile attempted to change the future was kind of sad, cuz like I get that he's hoping it'll have a ripple effect or whatever but changing who captures this bad guy may change one word of the news broadcast but it probably won't change the circumstances he found himself in?? Idk, I hope he doesn't get too caught up in the little stuff on that, though I'm sure he's gonna be going nuts to try and change the future from now on. Lastly there was the Cisco/HR thing which was kind of meh because while I love Cisco I don't find HR particularly interesting, nor did I find his whole reopen star labs thing to be an interesting plot, so I hope they're able to work that into something actually interesting by the end of the season, because there's definitely a lot of potential at least. And yeah, good episode. After that I watched Suits which my dvr didn't record for some strange reason (I think frequency might've been on at the same time, but that won't be an issue anymore) and was decisively underwhelmed by the episode. I mean, the show's been going downhill for a while, and the stuff about Mike's trial was interesting, but his prison arc was pretty dry and now that he's out it's all back to "the firm!! Ahh!! What's gonna bring it down this time???" like that seems to be the problem with watching shows about private lawyers instead of government employed ones, their conflict is always gonna be like "the firm is collapsing!" and after a while it gets BORING (just ask the good wife, and all the times they split firms and reunited them and crushed them). So basically everyone was just yelling at each other for a whole episode and I wasn't very amused. I have to say though, Harvey having the idea that Mike would even ever get in front of the character and fitness board is a joke, because he wouldn't even get into law school, much less actually pass character and fitness?? Like are you shitting me??? Nor would he ever be able to get any job remotely related to law, so he needs to drop that shit now. I do feel bad for Rachel though, she's in a tough spot when it comes to that stuff. But yeah, wasn't very impressed there. After that I was out of things to watch again, so I decided I would start the minority report tv series, I think I mentioned last week that we had been talking about it in crim pro and I saw that Nick Zano was in it so of course that made me want to watch it, and it's only 10 episodes so it won't take long, I ended up watching 4 tonight. It's pretty good! I've never actually seen the movie, lol, but I know the concept and since it's set like 10 years after the movie you don't really need to know all the details of the movie to understand what's going on. I have to say though, omg, the legal implications of all of this is OFF THE WALL. Like I could probably rant for a solid hour about all of the reasons this is all incredibly unconstitutional and illegal and couldn't never happen, and they were like "oh yeah the pre-crime program before the Supreme Court ruled it unconstitutional" and I like snorted because the idea of them still having a Supreme Court and it taking them SIX YEARS to overrule that is suchhhhhh a joke lol. And don't even get me started on the whole "well it wasn't set in stone" concept because that would just completely implode and legal legitimacy it had, at all. But, now that I got that out, it's a pretty cool concept. Nick Zano's character is the twin brother of the main character, who is working with a detective to try and stop the murders he still sees flashes of but without the whole pre-crime program and all its unconstitutionality, and it works pretty well I'd say, it's interesting. Nick Zano's character is kind of an asshole, but he's funny and him and their sister are very distrusting of the whole thing but he still ends up helping his brother, though their sister is like having flashes of the government taking them again and shit so that could go wrong soon. We'll see what the rest of the season brings, there's only 10 episodes so they can't really get into anything too elaborate (hopefully, anyway, because an unfinished story sucks). While watching that I did take a break to watch the premiere of Riverdale, because why the fuck not, I've been seeing promos of it for weeks now and it was on so I might as well watch it. I like know the comic strip exists but like, it's not something I've ever really read or been familiar with, so I was pretty much going in blind here. Interesting first episode. They're definitely playing on the whole oh this town is in the middle of nowhere so even though we're technically setting this in the present day we're gonna act like it's actually the 50's with some stuff. I like Veronica, she's amusing, and I like that she seems to be looking out for Betty just because it's the right thing to do. Betty is fine, seems pretty stereotypical female lead who's in love with her male best friend at this point, but that could develop more. Archie is interesting, how whole having an affair with his music teacher and them witnessing part of a murder they can't tell anyone about or they'd get caught is certainly interesting, so we'll see where that plot goes. But yeah, not bad, and that pretty much wraps up my night. It's like 1:20 am right now, so without further to do I'm going to head to bed. Goodnight peeps. Happy Friday.